


The Black Canary

by Merfilly



Category: Birds of Prey (Comic), DCU (Comics), Green Arrow (Comics), Justice League of America (Comics), Justice Society of America (Comics)
Genre: Background Relationships, Canon - Comics, Ensemble Cast, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-23
Updated: 2018-12-07
Packaged: 2019-08-28 02:41:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 15
Words: 50,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16715021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: A study of Dinah Laurel Lance, set against cherry-picked events of 71 years of canon. From childhood to the Lazarus Pit and a little past.





	1. Early Childhood

**Author's Note:**

> This is a re-imagining that draws strongly on 71 years of canon, and attempts to form a cohesive canon for what the singular universe formed after Crisis on Infinite Earths might have looked like. Some events or ages have been redone to fit better. Some have been ignored. Some dialogue was lifted directly from the comic book sources.
> 
> Rating and pairings are for the full work. The chapter with Graphic Violence will be noted as such. A number of characters from the League and JSA appear, as well as rogues that appeared in the canon.
> 
> Many thanks to my partner, ilyena_sylph, for holding my hand and helping me sort it all out.

_1960s_

Larry Lance was pacing. He didn't know how the other husband in the waiting room was managing to stay in his chair. Charles McNider had given him far too many possibilities about the difficulties Dinah was currently facing for him to just wait patiently!

"You really ought to sit down, Larry," Johnny said, even as he empathized with the worried husband. Dinah Drake-Lance was a petite woman and Larry…was not a small man. If the baby took after him, Dinah was in for a hard time of it.

"I can't." Larry looked over to see Dinah's best friend and frequent partner for the last… well, keeping time around heroes got hard. Especially when things happened to move them around in time. Larry was just going to go with several years.

He distinctly remembered the forties, remembered some guy in Washington pushing all the heroes into retirement to protect their loved ones just after that war in Korea… and now there was something heating up in the southeastern corner of Asia, but Larry was certain the years between had vanished for them all.

"It will be — "

Johnny's words tapered off as the doors leading back to the delivery rooms opened and a nurse in a prim white uniform appeared.

"Mister Lance?"

Larry did not rush over… but it was a near thing. "Yes ma'am?"

"You have a baby girl, sir. I can show you to the nursery," she told him.

"My wife?" Larry quickly asked, even as he fell in step with the woman.

"She'll be in a room shortly," the nurse said. "We'll come for you and the baby then."

"Thank you, ma'am."

He was taken to a large window in front of a nursery full of newborns, just in time to see a pink-ribboned nursery cart being rolled in. Larry swallowed as the nurse indicated that was the child he and Dinah had created, and he peered in, staring at the tiny miracle.

She already had a head full of black hair, slicked down to her skull, and her face was red, almost splotchy, while wrinkles he had not expected caught his eyes.

"She… looks odd."

The nurse laughed. "Try being folded up in a space barely big enough for you before you complain about it. She'll look more like the babies on television in a few days, Mr. Lance."

"Ahh, that makes sense."

The nurse left him then and he stared, just watching as the baby slept in a swaddling blanket, entrancing Larry just by existing.

After… ten minutes, an hour? He didn't know, as time had no meaning while he watched their daughter sleep… a bit, the nurse came back and acquired the rolling nursery cart and Larry alike, guiding them back to a room, where Larry could see his wife.

She was so small in the hospital bed, and so very pale. Larry actually forgot about their child in his haste to get to her side, taking her hand and holding it as he worried about her, not their splotchy, red-faced infant.

"Oh don't fuss," Dinah told him, squeezing his fingers. "Let me see her?"

Larry moved so he wouldn't be between the baby and her mother, as the nurse raised the swaddled child out of the cart and brought her over. Dinah gratefully took the girl into her arms, snuggling her close.

"Our little one," she murmured, even as Larry leaned down to look more closely.

"Dinah Laurel Lance," Larry said, the name they had decided on between them.

"Little Miss," Dinah said, agreeing, and sharing the nickname she had already decided on.

"Junior, by the end of the week, to at least half her uncles," Larry wagered.

"Probably."

+++

Every single member of the team had made it through the Lance household within that first month. Even Alan and Ted, who had both lost children without ever getting to know them, came to see the first living child of the pact made by the team.

Larry worried at first, that such visits would be too much excitement, but Little Miss slept through most of them, content to be held by whichever 'aunt' or 'uncle' passed through. Dinah appreciated the company, as most of them either pitched in with household help, or brought food that could easily reheat to tide the small family over through the sleepless nights.

It was Johnny, though, that was on hand most, as he gave Dinah all his support, just as he had ever since their first team-up. Larry came to rely on the man, once Dinah was strong enough to go back to work in the flower shop, on those rare occasions Larry had to follow up on a case at inconvenient hours. Between them, they managed the baby, the shop, and both the private investigations as well as the police consultations Larry still gave for the precinct.

+++

Dinah froze as she saw what Larry was bringing in the door. Little Miss was playing quietly in the playpen, and Dinah did not want to upset her by raising her voice.

"Larry?" she asked, in a very forced but quiet tone.

"Bedroom?" Larry invited, understanding the tone, but adamant that he had to do what he was planning on. They just weren't getting enough money in through their businesses.

The couple adjourned to the bedroom, where Larry put the two uniforms carefully in his part of the closet.

"Tell me those are security guard uniforms," Dinah entreated.

"I don't lie to you, wife," he said. "The department was pretty hard hit with transfers out after that last mob case broke badly. The chief called me up and offered to bring me back on, and to treat it as uninterrupted service, so my years before will add to the years now, for a pension."

Dinah sat down on the bed, a deep breath escaping her. "The books have been bad," she admitted. "But I don't like it. You know how corrupt it is. Worse than when Daddy was alive."

"I know. They're giving me a shiny transfer in from Chicago. Name of Gordon… his record looks decent, so maybe it will work out."

Dinah wrinkled her nose. "Probably afraid of the new boy exposing something too soon, before they can get their hooks in him."

"Then they've made a huge mistake, inviting me to put mine in him,"Larry said, coming to stand in front of her. "Just a few years, Dinah. Long enough to sock a little away, and actually hit proper retirement, so we have the pension too."

"Alright. I can do this. If you can, after all. Just… be careful."

"Hey! It's me!"

Dinah half-laughed as she wrapped her arms around his waist. "I know! But it's still a really bad idea for Black Canary to come rescue you!"

"Someday, maybe," Larry whispered, knowing it chafed on her to not run the nights any more.

+++

Dinah Laurel was a quick-witted child, and Larry found that fooling her was near impossible. The way she saw through his excuses of being too tired, and lightly rested her hand over the bandages where he'd been shot was uncanny.

"It's not bad, Little Miss," he told her, mush as he had soothed his wife once he got in around two in the morning. "Just got a little scorched." The bullet had grazed him, but he'd be sore for days. He just wasn't as young as he once had been.

She gave him a big-eyed look, and then carefully settled against his chest, on his left side, away from the hurt arm. "Dangerous," she said, showing off another big word. However, it was one she heard a lot, given her tendency to climb out of the crib she was still using, or up onto counters, or approaching strange animals fearlessly.

"That's what being a cop is, kiddo," he told her. "But it's also about keeping people safe. About making the world a better place. It's all we want to do."

Little Miss gave a nod, just as if she had understood all of that. "I want to, too!"

Larry smiled, thinking of her mother, of the JSA. "I'm sure you do. Maybe you will, some day."

+++

While Johnny might have been Dinah's favorite partner of choice during her adventuring days, it was quickly apparent that Little Miss preferred Wildcat, Ted Grant, out of all her uncles to babysit her.

Larry was fairly certain he knew why, as the girl pushed through her toddler years into a sturdy, if petite, child of school age. Ever since Little Miss had said she was going to be both a cop and a superhero, all at the age of three, Dinah had been apprehensive over the influence the other JSA members had on their daughter.

Never mind the fact that she had given up and starting venturing out again in her wig and fishnets. Larry turned a blind eye to the new adventures his wife went on with various teammates, far from Gotham, so as to keep their home safe. He kept his hours as minimum as he could so that one of them was available, but when they both were gone… Wildcat was there.

Larry suspected Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons, visited at times too, but never where she could be seen by any adult.

If they were both teaching Little Miss, or even if it were only Wildcat, at least it meant she would be ready, some day, when the need to adventure and protect others called her too strongly to obey her mother's wishes.

+++

"Uncle Ted," Little Miss began, looking for all the world like an innocent lamb, which put Wildcat on guard fast enough. "Why does Mama not want me to be like her? She's not real happy about me trying for the Academy either, when I'm older."

Oh. Ted wondered how bad it had gotten, and if this was why Dinah had gone out to the west coast to help Starman for a week.

"Well, Di, back a long time ago, when we all first started, before the Big War? It wasn't that bad. We stopped the thieves and sometimes kidnappers, but nobody got that badly hurt. And then a lot of us went and helped in the Big War, came back… and watched as the world seemed to get sicker and sicker. Your Uncle Charlie lost the woman he loved, and your uncle Alan lost his brand new wife and the baby she was going to have."

He didn't mention Irina and the child he knew she'd had. They had never found a trace, after all, so why bother Little Miss with that?

"A lot of people decided we heroes were the problem. So we stopped… mostly. Kept it secret when we did, and the world kept changing, kept getting worse. Your mama just doesn't want to see you walk into that and all the hurt that comes with it."

"She still does," Little Miss said, not without some sulkiness. "And Daddy went back to being a policeman until just last year. Why can't I choose who and what I will be when I grow up, like they did?"

Ted wished with all his heart Polly was around, but she hadn't been back to Man's World in over three years. He had to handle this on his own, so he crouched down. "There's a reason your aunt and me, some of the others teach you all we know. Your mama might be scared for you… but we think it would be worse if you don't know how to do things.

"You pay close attention to your daddy's private eye work, learn those tricks. You keep up on all the fighting and tricks we can teach you… and some day, Hellcat, you'll be just what you want to be. I promise. Just keep it all quiet from your mama, until it's the right time, you hear?"

"Yes, sir," Little Miss answered that, before she pushed him some, making him laugh as she took advantage of his weight not being balanced. "Teach me more?"

"Of course."


	2. Growing Up, Little by Little

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: Accidental harm to parents by their child, attempted assault on a minor, continued headbutting between a parent and child

_1970s_

She was eleven the first time she got into an argument with her mother over her future. Dinah Laurel Lance knew that with what she had been born to, with all the help she could muster from her mother's team, she could be either the best clean cop Gotham had ever seen, or a superhero.

She didn't see why she shouldn't train for both.

"Little Miss, not another word about being a cape!" Dinah yelled at her daughter, and immediately regretted it, but Di just squared her jaw, not seeing the regret.

"You got to choose your life! There's no guarantee I will make the cut as a cop and I want to help!"

"We're not having this discussion now, or ever again," Dinah said in a steely voice, making her carbon-copy child lift her chin in defiance. "Focus on your grades, your sports all that you want, but this world is no place for any of what we did when we were younger! It's too dangerous!"

"Mama—"

"I said 'no'!"

With that, the elder stalked away, and her daughter was left to steam all alone over it.

+++

Larry looked at his daughter in the passenger side seat. He could see all the signs of a full sulk in place, and Dinah had all but stormed out of the house with a gear bag in hand.

"Something on your mind?" he asked her as he drove the beat up old Buick toward the East Side.

"No." She paused then, realizing how she sounded, and took in a deep breath. "No, sir. Sorry, Daddy. Just a little strung out is all."

"Never a good thing to be, Little Miss. And I find talking about it helps, usually."

She folded her hands in her lap and looked out the window. "Why, when Mama runs off to do things with the other JSA people, does she think I can't grow up to be a hero?"

Larry winced; he'd been afraid that was the crux of the matter.

How did he answer her without stepping on his wife's toes? He personally didn't want either of them ever doing it, but they were shaped to the adventure, the need to do good by others, much as he had been. Old Man Drake, his father-in-law, had stressed to him that he could not clip Dinah's wings.

So why couldn't Dinah see she was clipping her daughter's?

"When things first started, Little Miss, it was like a slightly more dangerous game of Crooks and Cops," Larry said. "And the bad guys went to jail, while the good guys disappeared into the night. Then… someone figured out who your Uncle Charlie was. Things got bad, for a lot of the team.

"You're not supposed to be oldest," he told her, which made her head whip around. "Your uncle Alan thought his first wife was expecting when bad things happened there. And … your uncle Ted has a son somewhere out there that just vanished with his mother."

Di swallowed hard at hearing that, her eyes welling up with tears. She'd never known. Her uncle Ted gave her so much time and training, had even opened a gym in Gotham to be closer.

"I didn't know," she said softly.

"No. It was decided not to tell you, not until you were older." Larry reached over and smoothed her hair back. "It's what drives your mama to tell you no, but still go out there and do what she does. She wants to make it safer, but she's afraid it will never be safe enough for you, for any child of a hero, or their family in general.

"She's stopped fussing so much about the Academy, Little Miss. And Gotham needs good cops. Every time I meet with Jim for coffee, he tells me that. So why don't you focus in that direction?"

"Because I don't think I'll make it, Daddy." She sniffled a little against the sadness for her extended family. "Mama didn't."

"Your mother had three things going against her back then, Little Miss. She was a woman, when there were only so many matron spots available. She was also under the height minimum for even the women. Both of those things have changed, and you might be a little taller than her some day," Larry said.

"What was the third?" Dinah asked, curious.

Larry laughed. "Your grandpa was her dad." He shook his head in amusement. "Honest cop, from a long line of them. Worse, he had the respect of a lot of the harbor rats, the same ones I try to steer clear of real trouble. Which meant he was hard to touch in any permanent way.

"Pretty sure they were terrified of what his daughter would be like, given that she'd mostly only ever known the old man, your gram having died when your mama was only a child."

"Wasn't he your partner, Daddy? Did that cause trouble for you when you and Mama fell in love?"

"Been watching too much of that new soap opera, haven't you?"

"No!" Di giggled though. "Sometimes dads don't like who their daughters date. That's fact."

Boy and was it ever, Larry thought, glad those years were still a bit off. His Little Miss could be a perfect little lady or an outright tomboy, depending on her mood, but he was dreading when the lady part started showing all the time.

"He wasn't keen on it at first," Larry admitted. "Then again, your mama was less keen on it. It took a few years, and me eventually putting the uniform away to really get her to pay attention to me."

"That's why she was upset when you went back for a little while?"

"No… she was worried I'd get shot seriously," Larry admitted. "I wasn't popular with the others on the force, or with some of the bigger mobsters. That's why I kept it as short a time as I could, to get what we all needed out of it, but not worry her too long."

Di scrunched her nose up. "But you have to worry when she goes away. You don't even usually know where she is, not until after, and that only if the paper mentions them."

Larry shook his head. "I trust her team to take care of her. She couldn't trust all of mine, because we both knew there were crooked cops all over Gotham's force."

"Oh."

She settled and Larry let it lapse into silence. He really didn't expect any of the words said to dissuade her; she was very much the child of her parents. Maybe, just maybe, she'd keep her wishes quieter… and make certain not to get caught training.

+++

"That's it, Hellcat. Hit it again!"

The twelve year old threw herself into the rhythm of punch, punch, kick, working out her temper. Today it had been an argument over choosing soccer over cheerleading. Two weeks ago, it had been a discussion of slacks versus skirts.

Her mother was not being subtle, not in the least, by trying to push the girly-girl image and things her way.

"Perhaps, more than that cloth and sawdust, one would wish to strike an opponent that moves?" an older man, wearing foreign clothes, said, making Di catch and stop the body bag. She had seen the man earlier; they didn't get many Asian men in the gym that weren't there expressly on Uncle Ted's invitation to teach her.

She stepped away from the bag, glanced at her uncle to see he wasn't certain about this, but she had a good feeling about it. People didn't volunteer to spar with girls, after all. Not that politely, anyway.

"I do like to test against people, sir. My name is Dinah Lance," she said, politely, before bowing her head to him, the way she'd learned over at the dojo.

"They call me Sensei, when I teach, and teaching is what I live to do," he answered her.

Sensei. That meant teacher, or was used as 'master' in some martial arts.

"I would be honored to learn," Di said respectfully, and she thought she saw a twinkle in his eye as he gave her a minimal nod. They moved together toward the open mats, so they could begin. The teacher let her take a beginning stance before he chose his. She narrowed her eyes, seeing the discreet differences that said 'jui-jitsu' instead of the modernized judo.

If she hadn't been passionately devouring every piece of martial art lore and technique she could find since she was much smaller, she probably would not have seen it. What had she read about the difference? The parent form of her mother's, and her own, preferred art taught fewer strikes, and more evasions… but was adept at countering strikes.

He lived to teach, he had said. Dinah recalled something one of her own teachers had said, that the best payment was a student who paid attention. She made herself study his every move as they worked out with one another, her temper forgotten.

By the end of the session, she was smiling radiantly, and Sensei was encouraging her in her pursuit of The Art.

All in all, Ted decided that day had been a surprisingly good one, and he made an effort to see if the man would be willing to come around once in a while to hone his Hellcat.

+++

At thirteen, Di had gotten very good at pretending to just be a teen-aged girl focused on getting through school. That didn't keep her from wheedling along on her daddy's stakeouts for his private investigations, at least whenever her mother wasn't home. In the course of doing that, Larry got to a point where he sometimes let her practice observation skills on the light cases, getting her used to paying attention to the details.

Tonight was one of those nights. She was just supposed to watch to see if a certain man put an envelope in a particular door slot. That was all. She was loving that her daddy trusted her enough to do that, while he handled a different side of the same case. She was focused completely on —

— all of her focus fled as she heard a quick cry of pain and fear, and she was moving before she really knew what she was doing.

She honed in on the sound of a scuffle, and got there just as a girl about her own age put all of her weight behind a slashing strike with her nails against a thug's face. The thug looked to be in his twenties, making Di's skin crawl. She didn't stop her momentum until she was launching a kick at the man's knee, dropping him to a level that made it even easier to deal with him.

The girl didn't hesitate to take advantage of that assistance either, landing a credible punch before shaking her hand at it having landed wrong.

"Unless you want to have to make up a story about how it wasn't two chicks that kicked your sorry tail, I think you better get the heck out of here!" Di snapped, glaring fiercely enough that the thug decided his chances were better somewhere else. He scrambled away, and then broke into a faltering run, his knee hobbling him, as soon as he saw the pair weren't going to follow up immediately.

That let Di size up the other girl, who was staring at her with frank consideration of her own.

"Looked like you'd've probably handled him, but… it's what I do," Di finally said. "Call me Di."

"Selina, and I would've… but you had style." The other girl looked in the direction of an approaching car, and hissed in a breath. "Gotta run… but if you're ever around this neighborhood, you can probably find me!" She hurried off, and Di shook her head, amazed at how easy it had been to act, to help when someone was in danger.

Her mama was wrong. The world needed more people willing to take risks, not less.

+++

Di had been helping in the flower shop since she had shown that was a skill a she also shared with her mother. Sometimes that meant she was alone in the shop, minding the till while Mama ran quick errands and Daddy was out picking up clues for his clients.

The neighborhood toughs knew it, too.

She knew they were trouble before they even entered the shop, three boys with nothing but time and a need for fast cash on their hands.

"Can I help you?" she asked, pretending all was well, even as she picked up the roll of quarters that she'd been meaning to put in the till the next time she had to open it.

The boys looked at each other, before the shortest one looked at her, eyes glinting with malice.

"Give us all the money, and that might be all we touch," he said.

"Hmm, sorry. That's not a service we give," she answered in a faux sweet voice. Her reply, and the absolute confidence made the tallest one to the left hesitate, and confused the other two.

"Look, kid!" the leader blustered, trying to take control of the situation. "We're taking the cash! Don't make us trash your place… or worse." The look he gave her said what worse would be, and the fourteen-year old girl decided enough was enough. They were advancing, getting closer, staying in the open space between the displays.

"I suggest you get out," she said, body shifting off the stool she used at the counter, still keeping it between her and the boys, roll of quarters tucked into her hand, ready to fling.

They started to laugh… and the quarter roll smacked into the leader's forehead, small end first so that all of its weight and force made his eyes roll, dazing him for the moment. She let the other two being surprised buy her time for the jump past the counter. She landed a solid punch to the guts of the one on the right, sliding into a bounce-ready stance as he staggered back into the work table. She met the eyes of the tallest one, jaw gone hard with intent.

He must have decided this was more than he wanted to cope with, because he grabbed the leader's shoulder and pulled.

"Come on! It ain't worth it!"

The leader gave a blind swipe in her direction that she merely dodged, and then she blocked the one coming from his buddy to her side.

"Get. Out."

She didn't notice the plants nearby shaking, didn't understand why all three were grabbing at their heads, but she did think she might be coming down with something, the way her throat felt. The trip scrambled over themselves to get out of the shop, and Di was happy that nothing had been broken. She turned to retrieve the quarter roll, and saw her mother framed in the doorway coming out of the back of the shop.

Despite her accomplishment of the moment, Di quailed with fear at the look on her mother's face, before reminding herself that she had chosen her own path. No matter what her mother thought, she was going to be the best damned cop or hero she could be.

"I suggest you go upstairs," Dinah told her daughter, in a quiet, low voice.

Di decided she would let her mother have this one, and went up to her room to tackle her homework.

She'd have to tell Selina, next time she helped Daddy in the East End, about today, refusing to let the thrill of winning fade, even in the face of her mother's dismay.

+++

Dinah ignored the incident in the shop, didn't even bring it up. She knew Di had been learning martial arts. It was hard to ignore just how much time she spent at Ted's gym, after all.

It was less that fact and more how readily, how confidently, her daughter had been handling the situation. There'd been rumors that their neighborhood had less trouble with the growing gangs than some others, and now Dinah wondered if that was Little Miss's doing.

Her daughter wasn't even fifteen and wouldn't be for another few months! That was as bad as Wesley having brought in Sandy to run with them so young, and look what had happened to him!

Worse than that realization was the one about herself.

She had, for just a moment, felt a deep surge of pride, to see Little Miss so completely in charge of the situation. It had taken several seconds for that to fade, and the fear over how bad the world really was to take back over.

She felt so much conflict, and if she just ignored the incident, then she could pretend it was all about Di having used her skills she'd learned for self-defense, and not about her trying to become a hero.

She didn't even remember that she'd been surprised by the plants shaking, not then.

+++

"Dinah Laurel Lance, if you walk out that door — "

Almost a year of steadily growing resentment and arguing had brought them to this point. Larry hurried to get to the living room, to try and defuse the situation.

"I don't care what you think, Mama! This is who and what I am! I have to try!"

"Young lady, this is your last warning!"

Larry entered, reaching for his wife's shoulders to calm her, before she said something they would all regret.

"Or what, Mama? You leave us at the drop of a hat, go off and do everything I want to do some day, but I'm not allowed to make the little things happen? What kind of logic is that?! How do you get away with telling ME —"

The noise that erupted on that emotionally charged noise slammed into both Larry and Dinah, throwing them back hard enough to break the plaster of the wall. He groaned, feeling shaken in his very bones as he slid down, cushioning Dinah's encounter with the floor somewhat. He tried to make sense of it, tried to understand, and looked to his daughter.

Di's face was a study in absolute horror and panic… before she fled, running off to who-knew-where! He couldn't really hear anything, his ears ringing with the aftermath of whatever that had been that shoved the two of them into the wall.

"Dinah?" he managed weakly, realizing she was far more stunned, having been in front of him when it hit them.

For answer, she just turned in his arms, curling there for a long moment, body shaking with fear of what their daughter might be. Eventually, one of them would need to go find her… but they needed to face the idea that she might just be more than either of them could handle.

+++

Selina had been expecting to meet up with Di this night. She hadn't expected to find her on a bench in 'their' park, knees tucked to her chest, arms around them, with the small motorbike carelessly laid down in sight of the bench.

She did not like this at all, and hoped she could help her friend with whatever it was.

"Your mother?" Selina asked as she sat down on the bench, sliding an arm around her friend.

"Me."

Well that wasn't a great start, especially as that odd burr was in the air, rippling in the single syllable. Selina had noticed it from time to time, but never really placed what it was.

Di apparently noticed it too, this once, and flinched.

"What is it?"

Di turned her face fully away from Selina, which was so unlike her. She was big on eye contact, unless she was working with someone that couldn't do it.

"Something wrong with my voice," Di told her, keeping her voice as soft as she could. "I… I was angry. And I yelled at Mama… Daddy was behind her.

"They flew backwards into the wall, Selina. Hit it really hard, because of my voice."

"Oh." Selina caught Dinah's chin and turned her back to see her eyes, hating the tears there that refused to fall. "Di? Whatever is in your head now? That's a reaction to the stress. This is something that can be fixed. They can't be hurt too bad; you wouldn't have left them if they were.

"So, we just need to figure it out, just like any other tool you and I use."

Di wanted to believe that, wanted to so much… but in the end, she just moved to be held by her best friend, wanting to wake up and just be normal.

After all, so many of the ones that had powers, the ones that couldn't turn them off, were monsters that the JSA had to fight.

+++

Larry leaned forward, hands cupped around a mug of coffee, watching his daughter pick at her sundae.

"It's not the end of the world, Little Miss," he said. "We'll figure it out."

"Not gonna lock me up like Sandy?"

"Di, why do you think we'd ever? Haven't we tried to support you always?" Larry asked her, and then flushed at the rebellious look in her eyes.

He had been quick to tell her to hide her real aim.

"Can't be a cop now," she muttered. "I know the law."

That was true. When meta-humans first began to appear, the corrupt cops and politicians very quickly excluded them from the public venue, outlawing them from becoming any form of public servant. Larry supposed the entrenched powers had just wanted to protect their own niche.

"This isn't the end of things," Larry told her. "It's kind of like your voice does for you what your mama's little pellets do… just with a bit more punch."

She half-smiled at the way he'd made his voice rise on that, and he began to feel hope. Maybe she'd come through this alright after all.

"How… angry is she?"

"Oh she's not angry. Or if she is, it's just her working through fear, Little Miss," Larry told her. "Ted and Alan came over, fixed up the wall, and talked to her a long while." He reached over and patted her hand. "Eat that ice cream, and stop fretting over all this. So you have a new trick. Might be something the Thunderbolt decided to gift you with. Or, and this was Alan's guess, it might have something to do with how your mama had known so many cosmic beings before you came along.

"Either way, we'll figure out how to control it, and then you can work on how you want to use it." Larry gave her a very gentle smile. "Doesn't change that we love you, Little Miss. And sure as heck doesn't mean we're scared of you, so get that thought out of your head."

"What if I'm a little scared of it, and me? I know I have a temper, and that seems to kick it up." Di looked at him but took a bit of the melting sundae.

"I think that's all a part of growing up strong and capable, Little Miss," he said. "Even without nifty little tricks with your voice. Because you get to a point where you see how different you are from the people content to live as sheep in this world, and you just know that you could go one of two ways from there.

"Your mama, your uncles? They chose to go the good way with being strong like that. And you've been choosing the good way all your life. You want to make a difference by helping, not ruling. And that's why it is all going to be just fine, Little Miss."

She bit her lip a little, then worked on the sundae until it was all gone, weighing those words. Larry hoped it was helping, that she was coming to terms with being a meta-human, just like he and her mother were doing. He finished off his coffee, dropped a tip on the table when it looked like she was ready, and walked out with her to tackle the future.

He had a feeling that, knowing his daughter, it was going to be an explosive one, but worth having.


	3. Growing Up, Little by Little, Part II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Notes: Parental death, strained child-parent relationships, period-accurate prescription med use and attitude toward same

A parade to honor the JSA, once headquartered right there in their own city, was an amazing thing. Di was excited, and so was her family. Di and Larry would show up as part of the crowd, while Dinah would be with her team at the heart of things, decked out in the leather and wig and domino.

It was a bright, wonderful day and everything would be just perfect, the entire family knew!

Watching from the sidelines, Di got to see all of her aunts and uncles, once part of the JSA or its sister team, the All Stars. She had met most of them, and knew some of them even had kids now, though much younger than she was. They were all under the teams' protections, just like she was, and that made them family, even if she hadn't met them yet.

The crowds were huge, and there was so much noise all around her. It was wonderful… until she caught a different noise, all the way at the head of the parade, where the core team made up of Doctor Fate, Hour-Man, the Spectre, the Sandman, the Atom, the Flash, Green Lantern, and Hawkman were. Others were further back, more or less in the order of how they had joined the teams, so why was there panic and mayhem up ahead?

"Daddy, something's wrong," she said urgently, getting his hand and tugging.

Larry trusted in his daughter, and let her lead… soon having to get in front of her though, as the crowds began running away from the parade. Then, they could hear the sound of fighting, and see the pyrotechnics of the powers being used.

"Junior," Larry said, to show how serious he was. "This is way out of your league, baby. Do not get in the middle of it."

Di made a face, but they kept moving until they could see the cosmic being that had… oh no, he'd managed to get the Cosmic Rod away from Starman! Dr Fate was holding a shield up to protect the team, backed by Green Lantern's ring, but it was a struggle for both of them to hold the being back!

She tried to follow the furious fight, watching as the teams fell into well-practiced mini-teams, joining abilities to try and both protect the people still trying to escape as well as defeat the threat. Some of the non-powered fighters had had to fall back, hurt, but Di could see her mother on the edge of that group, closer to the fight than some, but well back from Johnny Thunder and Starman, who normally partnered her.

She realized her father wasn't at her side, and saw him trying to get to the injured people and fighters, wanting to help. She should do that too; she had taken the first aid course offered by the free clinic in the East End. She moved, suiting action to thought —

— and time seemed to slow all around her as she saw her father suddenly change direction, diving toward the Black Canary, as a bolt of energy was aimed her way. Di screamed, the energy of her voice going in the direction of the threat, but it was undirected, raw, and could not save the man that was the center of her life.

He went down under the bolt of yellow energy, and did not move again. That was about the same time that Hawkman managed to strike the Cosmic Rod out of the being's hands with his mace, the nth metal causes a shower of sparks all around both of them.

Di was frozen to the spot, a sick feeling in her soul even as her mother gave up on protecting the others to run to her fallen husband. Seeing her mother go prostrate over the man's body broke the fear, and Di ran forward, heedless of the rest of the fight that was trying to contain or banish the strange being.

"Mama?" Di asked, tone begging for it not to be as bad as she thought it was. Dinah looked at her, tears streaking her face under the domino, spilling down her cheeks.

"Oh baby," Dinah whispered, sobbing more as she reached for her child, and Di had to bite her lip hard to keep from keening in grief for her father.

+++

Ted Grant climbed the fire escape slowly, still feeling every single punch he'd thrown at the being, blows that had left his hands scorched. Dr Fate had said the being called itself Aquarius and was something called a sentient star.

He was just glad it had been banished before the cost had been any higher.

That price had been too high as it was.

He made it to the roof at last, and found the girl he'd hoped was up here. She was sitting on the edge of the building, all the way on the other side, and he had to steel himself. Why did she have to have a head for heights like this?

"Hellcat?" he called, not wanting to spook her, though his steps should have been enough. She didn't look away from the street or answer, so he made himself go and sit beside her. He hated being up this high.

They sat there for several minutes, with Ted painfully aware that Di was not crying. She really hadn't since that first day, not where anyone could see. He was trying to find the right words for her, something to ease her pain, but Larry had been her father, a doting one that had been home almost more than his wife.

How did you help a child past that? Especially one that loved so deeply?

"He warned me not to get involved. He should have listened to his own words," she finally said, and Ted heard the wisp of anger in those hurting words.

"Atom said he was trying to help the ones down," Ted said. "As a former cop, that's a skill he's got."

"I know. I saw. I saw it all, because I was trying to get to them too."

Ted winced; he'd really hoped she had not actually seen her father fall. It was never easy to be close to death.

He put an arm around her, feeling how rigid she was through her shoulders and back.

"Shouldn't have been him," she whispered.

Ted couldn't actually argue that, not easily. But, if he had seen someone he loved in the direct path of danger, he knew he couldn't have held back either.

"Mama isn't really talking."

"Noticed that, Di," he said. "Johnny said he's made all the arrangements. One of your richer cousins is helping pay for the funeral, I heard."

She wrinkled her nose. They didn't have much in common with the industrialist Drakes. But it was kind of them. Family should pull together for things like this, and Di knew money was tight, most of the time. The gas crisis had driven up the costs on everything.

"You probably ought to come in before those clouds get serious," Ted pointed out.

"I will. Soon. Just… needed space. Away from the emptiness in there," she said, pointing down to their shop and apartment.

"Want me to go?"

Di looked at him then, and slowly nodded. "Need to think."

"Alright… but I'm sending the Thunderbolt up if you don't come in before the storm."

She didn't even smile at that, just went back to watching the street.

+++

Di noted the members of the JSA that were present, hidden in somber black suits and dark glasses and veiled hats. She watched as her mother kept her silence through the funeral, dabbing now and then at her eyes.

Johnny was at her side, as always. He had been close throughout their careers, a friendship that Di's Daddy had dubbed 'her other boyfriend' without a trace of jealousy, and it had always made Johnny stammer and blush.

Di's throat choked on the memory, and she made her eyes fixate on the priest. Uncle Wesley had offered, but it felt right to let the man from their local church handle it. She'd made it through everything so far; she could get through the funeral without making a mess of herself.

Never mind that the tears had been escaping, tracking slowly down her face. Uncle Ted had tried once to give her his handkerchief, but she had ignored it, like the tears themselves, in hopes of keeping herself under control.

Her throat was so tight with the power she barely managed to control at her best.

She held tight to her need to be strong, all the way to her mother turning and coming to her side, so they could go home. Dinah was crying now, and despite all their differences of opinions and arguments, Di could not ignore her mother's pain right now. She reached out, and wrapped her arms around her mother, holding her close. More tears than she had wanted to show came, and soon she was outright sobbing, silently, as they held each other.

Their world was broken, but they still had each other at least.

+++

Di really didn't want to know how Selina managed to slip out of the home for delinquents so often, but right now she was glad of it. It was nearly two in the morning, and the pair had managed to chase off some vandals before finding a rooftop.

"How is everything?"

"Mom found Prince Valium to be a better friend than uncle Johnny," Di said in a sour tone. "I mean, I get it. She's hurting. The team decided they just can't risk anything by being public, not when there are kids and spouses.

"So most of them have gone back to their hometowns to settle down." Di took a deep breath. "The gym closed."

"I know. I went to see if I could get a few more lessons, and saw the sign. I didn't expect him to leave us," Selina said.

"Possible lead on his kid, actually, so I don't blame him," Di told her best friend. "Been filling the time looking after Uncle Jim's brats."

Selina laughed at the depiction. Then again, cops' kids tended to be only a step behind the children of religious men. "At least it's money?"

Di nodded. "I'd watch them for free, but Uncle Jim needs to help us somehow."

"Rumor has it another vigilante is creeping around the city from time to time," Selina said. "Haven't seen him yet, but the mooks say he's a big guy."

"Let's hope he's not a chauvinist about the city, then," Di said. "I kind of like keeping our area, from mama's place to your neighborhood, clean on our own."

"Me too."

Selina moved a little closer, and Di opened her big jacket so they could share body heat in the cool of the night.

"I think the home is skimming," Selina said. "I'm going to try and prove it, see if that's enough to get me out of there for good."

"I hope you can, then. Just be careful? I don't want you going away where I can't see you," Di told her.

"It's me, little birdie. I always land on my feet," Selina purred at her.

Di laughed, and nodded. "You do… just keep it that way, will ya?"

"Promise." They settled in to enjoy the quiet of Gotham at sleep for a few more minutes, before they had to separate. Both of them were looking forward to a day when they didn't have to evade others to do what they wanted, making these stolen moments all the more precious to them.

+++

Selina's words of another vigilante came back to her in the spring, as she was intently pursuing a lead on who the new underboss for Falcone was. To move in Gotham, good or bad, you had to know the intricacies of the mafia. She'd already run into a few mooks that had been scared pissless by whoever the new guy was, letting her attempt to be the sweet, reasonable one.

"Nets, the new guy, he's not like you. He's just… tall and hard and scary!"

"Jimmy, how'd your nose get broken?" Di asked the man she was currently talking to very sweetly. The big muscle flinched, as he remembered ending up on the other side of her fist the previous year, the month before…

Yeah. The month before that ex-cop got killed at the parade, and Nets had hit the streets harder not long after the funeral. It hadn't taken a lot of smarts to piece together that Nets was the ex-cop's kid, or that she had ties to the capes. Even her nickname reflected that, as she wore mesh stockings under her hotpants, drawing eyes to those gorgeous deadly legs.

Maybe they were calling the wrong one scary. After all, Nets was half their size, not even full-grown… and she could lay out the biggest of them with her fists and feet.

"Point, point!" Jimmy said. "I dunno anything about the new capo. But they say he's got connections uptown, the kind that are going to make him harder to take down."

Di didn't like the sound of that, but she reached up and patted Jimmy's face. "Go home for the night, unless you just have to be out. I'm sure Jen is missing you."

Jimmy ducked his head. Maybe that's why Nets hadn't had an accident yet. She never gave the little guys over to the cops, though she'd left clues for Gotham's finest to pick up the bigger fish this last year. And she cared. She seemed to get it that people had to make ends meet.

Probably a good thing, that, given the rumors about her partner's growing interest in side work that was less about protecting the city and more about acquiring things.

"Thanks, Nets… for being you." He jogged off as she went to get on her beat up motorbike, glad he hadn't actually gotten beat up tonight.

+++

It was the next night that Di got the lead she needed, and was closing in on the new capo, intent on making a big enough mess for him that the cops could not ignore his presence among the mafia. She zipped along on her bike, aware that something had the goons and mooks all in a tizzy.

She brought the bike up short as she caught sight of movement on a roof to her left, not wanting to risk getting shot.

She saw a big guy on the edge of the roof, a two floor warehouse, so not terribly high up, being menaced by three goons.

Was this the new vigilante? Should she get up there to help—

The big man moved, throwing something that exploded in a cloud of dust and… fumes, if she was judging right by the coughing goons. One, however, barreled into the masked man. Di felt her heart in her throat until the masked man redirected the goon back onto the roof center… only to lose his footing in keeping the goon from taking them both over the edge.

He tucked and hit the ground with forward motion to save his legs the impact, making Di give him credit for having some skill.

"Nice fall," she said, eyes already tracking the goons breaking for the other side of the building. "They call me Nets down here."

"Heard of you… and I had it under control," the man said, voice deep with maturity. She gave him an eye-roll.

"Yeah, I know a fall when I see one," she said. "But neither here nor there. You working on Falcone's new man?"

"Yeah?"

"Get on, then, because your leads are running, and I know where to," she said, scooting forward on the small motorbike. He hesitated, and she almost just gunned it, to finish this alone. Then he moved, getting on behind her and figuring out how to hold on.

That was a good thing, as she took off at speed, not wanting the meeting to break up before she got to it and thumped enough heads to make the cops pay attention and come look at the guns and drugs delivery the new capo had arranged.

Di killed the engine nearly a block from the old fish factory, keeping it rolling to a slightly closer point before putting her feet down to let her passenger off. She gave him credit for not complaining about her handling skills, and quickly shoved the motorbike into a space behind a dumpster.

"C'mon," she said, guiding him toward the factory, her eyes glinting.

"You're sure?"

"Yeah. Delivery tonight; he's in there," she said. "We go and bust some heads, maybe get them tangled up in things, beat it before the cops show up."

"Direct… and might just work."

She made a scoffing noise at him. "Look, Mystery Man. I've been making life hard for this crowd for a couple of years now. You're the new player in the game. So cut off the bull, and work with me, so Gotham is a little safer."

She saw a shift in his body language when she said that, and that was another point for him. He cared about Gotham.

"I'll come in from up high," he said.

"That's good, because I like the doors," she answered, grinning like a fiend.

+++

Di had half-expected to find her new friend had vanished, in the aftermath of causing enough mayhem in the factory to achieve their aim. She'd scrambled for high ground at the first siren, and stayed to watch, ready to tackle anyone big enough to matter that tried to get out of the factory ahead of the cops.

He must have had the same thought, and joined her, throwing something that took out the one lieutenant that did make it out the door.

They stayed through the arrests, the paddy wagon actually coming for the haul, and didn't move until the not-so-observant police had gone their own way with the evidence.

She rolled to her side to actually look at him. Smart enough to wear gray and blue in the dark clothing he was using, so that he wasn't a black blob in shadows.

"You're a pretty solid fighter," she told him. "Smart too, to have picked up the trail when this isn't your territory. But I gotta tell you something, something you might not like."

"Oh?" He rolled to sit up, which prompted her to do it too.

"I don't know why a rich kid — yeah, you are. Your shoes, the kind of clothes you have on, your fingernails… they all say upper class — is slumming to protect Gotham. I kind of like it, because you have resources.

"But you need to learn about the people you're dealing with down here," she told him. "You terrorized the mooks and goons and that's actually going to make them resist you more. They can't help being poor, and not having the kind of avenues other people have. They take the jobs that let them feed their brothers, sisters, kids, parents… and your way is just going to make a lot of people suffer."

His jaw shifted under the mask, and she thought he might actually be listening to her. "Different lives, different motivations, different needs," he said. "Thank you… Nets."

She really was impressed. He had listened, seemed to grasp it. "So if I run into you again, what should I call you?"

He shrugged a shoulder. "You'll know, when you see me. I'm still working that out."

She gave him a warm smile for that admission. "It takes time."

"I have to go. I am glad I met you though."

"Same," she agreed, going to go find her motorbike and get home before her mother was awake.

+++

Di blinked as she came down, ready for school, to see her mother sitting at the table. "Mama?" she asked hesitantly.

Dinah looked up from her cup of coffee, and smiled. "I'm glad I caught you, honey, before school. I needed to tell you that there's been an opportunity that opened up, a business out west that Ted Knight is helping me get into."

Di didn't think she had heard right. But then, maybe a change would be good.

"Only a few more months of school," she said neutrally. "Shouldn't be too hard to get things packed up by then."

"Oh honey, no. This is going to be this month. We need to get away from here, from the memories, and start over," Dinah said. "The opportunity won't wait, and there won't be a better one."

Di felt all of her attempts at understanding and supporting her grieving mother come undone with those words. "You realize this is my senior year, right? That I have attended the same school my whole life, and now you are … just going to tear me away before I can finish that?"

"Oh don't be so selfish, Junior! It's not as if you care about school! All you want is to be able to sneak out and do everything I told you not to do!" Dinah snapped back, the smile and warm presence evaporating in the same moment her daughter exploded.

"I can't believe you! Our lives already got torn apart and now this?! And you're calling me selfish?!" Di snatched up her book bag and headed for the door. "I've got to get to school, because contrary to your opinion, I do care about it and I care about the people I have here!"

She didn't care that the door slammed behind her, both the apartment one and the one leading out the building downstairs.

All she knew was this was the most unfair, wrong-headed thing her mother had ever done… and if mama didn't change her mind, Di was going to wind up hating her forever. Staying behind now just wasn't an option, even if her father's former partner Jim would probably let her stay there.

Wrong-headed or not, that was Di's mother, and someone had to look after her.

+++

The shop was smaller, and they were in a townhouse, with the first floor the shop, and the apartment on the second floor, with adjacent shops and apartments on either side.

Di hated it. There was no garage space in the back of the building, not that she currently had a bike, having had to get rid of her motorbike before the move.

The sky was even dirtier than Gotham's with a perpetual haze trapped by the mountains to the east and the sea to the west. The idea that they were so close to Hollywood trampled all the consumer notions and glitzed every business.

The school was a full bus ride away, and so far Di hadn't passed two words with anything approaching human there, at least not to her standards. She was miserable, and missed Selina, missed the Mystery Man that had helped her a couple of times since their first meeting, missed her home!

Star City was nothing but a layer of lies and dirt as far as she was concerned.

Her mother was thriving again. And that… that cut deep into Di, leaving her resenting the woman even more than ever, while also trying to be faithful to the idea that family took care of one another. She had to endure this, had to give it her all, at least for her daddy's memory.

She looked out of the window of the shop, the one she had just cleaned, and hoped in her heart that she could figure out the hows and whys of this city, fast. If she was going to be stuck here in California, then she was going to figure out how to be a hero for the new city!

Someday, though, she would go home, back to Gotham, to the city that she loved, even with all of its own problems.


	4. Getting Her Wings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: Comic Book level violence and awkward flirting

_1980s_

It had been a year and a half since moving west. Despite herself, Star City was growing on her, because Di was seeing all the ways it needed someone who gave a damn about the place. Only, for all that her mother had mostly ignored her jaunts into the night scene, it was still a tense situation at home. 

Finding a tiny shop on the other side of town just after she turned eighteen was a god-send, and Dinah Laurel Lance went straight to the bank with her savings bonds, a solid work history (as she had been on the books of her mother's shop for years), and the small life insurance sum from her father's death that she was now eligible for.

If she was going to be a hero, she needed income, but she also needed the flexibility of not having a boss to report to.

Only once she had it all in hand, a lease signed on the shop, did she finally plan a night where she could tell her mother. She made dinner, set the table, and made herself be as pleasant as she could to the woman that had upended her life, and failed to give her any kind of support for her dreams.

She pushed that, her anger over it, to the side and sat down in her chair just as Dinah came in from working the shop. The elder woman's eyebrow went up, but she took her place and made just as much an effort to be civil.

"It smells good, Di."

"Thank you, Mama."

They ate in silence for a few minutes, then Di looked over. "The shop is doing well for you, Mama. And I've been looking at my options."

She saw her mother tense fully, and the look was one of resignation. "And?"

"I could have liquidated everything and gone back east," Di admitted. "But this place needs some help, and I've gotten used to it."

Dinah's jaw firmed as Di openly mentioned heroing, biting back her words to keep listening.

"I found a tiny little shop on the other side of town. It's got a space in the delivery room that I can park a bike, and the one room apartment above it is run down but has electricity and water, so I can get it livable. It won't be competing with your shop, but is close enough to a hospital to give me steady traffic. The Y on that side of town is also looking for instructors in sports; I think I can pitch judo as a sport of interest, pick up a little more work that way."

Dinah had just kept staring at her as the words unfolded, and when Di made herself meet her mother's eyes, it was to see tears glistening in the corners of her eyes. "You… you're not leaving?" she asked softly. "You'll still be here, in the city?"

The weight of losing Daddy and all of the JSA truly going into retirement hit Di in that moment, and she realized just how lonely her mother had to be, despite this having been her choice. How many memories, how many more reminders had her mother really been running from?

"Oh Mama." Di reached out for both of Dinah's hands, and squeezed once she had them. "I'll be here."

"Good. I like that." She took her hands back and started eating again, working her way around the meal with little questions about the shop, what Di was going to carry, and tidbits of advice. Di did file those away; her mother had kept a flower shop running for decades, while still being Black Canary.

She stayed in the kitchen as her mother took over the dishes, putting away the leftovers so the pots could get washed too. Finally, with the kitchen clean, Dinah took Di's hand and squeezed. 

"I never wanted the kind of life for you that you've chosen, Little Miss," Dinah said softly. "But you're set on it, and … it's time I accepted that. I'm also not getting any younger." She guided Di, who was so very confused, to the living room and opened the closet, digging to the back of it and coming out with a large duffel bag. "You need these. Can't have you running around looking like you, after all."

Di's heart was hammering as she sat down on the couch and opened the bag to find the Black Canary garb all carefully packed inside, to include the blonde wig in its own case on a mannequin head. 

"You'll probably have to rework the costume itself; motherhood spread things around after all," Dinah said, managing to tease, even though she had a lump in her throat to be passing the torch.

Di set it all to the side and shot over to her still standing mother, wrapping arms around her and just hugging tightly, even as the tears began and refused to stop. Before it was all said and done, both of them were crying, letting go of some of the painful years, to move forward into a better future.

+++

Di had raced toward the disturbance as soon as she heard. It was different than anything she'd ever faced, but the idea of an alien ravaging her new home was more than she was willing to tolerate. She didn't let herself think about her father, or JSA members that had fallen.

She was the Black Canary, and she had a mission.

The creature was large, vaguely humanoid, and seemed to be made of glass. It was causing other things to become glass as well, and Black Canary pulled the motorcycle up short of where it was. She wasn't going to risk rushing in until she knew what to do, as the police were having little effect.

Her eyes focused on the way the damage was spalling off in crystalline patterns, pausing to check a few shards. They were sharp, but definitely silicate-based.

A wicked smile let her lips, and she brought the motorcycle to full speed, humming to warm her voice. 

It was time for the Canary to sing.

The roar of the motorcycle, the one that had been her mother's pride and joy, dragged the alien's attention away from the police, and Di dragged in a deep breath as its face focused on her. It raised one hand in her direction, and Di let loose with the full Cry, something she had never done against a living opponent before.

The alien shattered, from the outstretched arm, all the way up into the torso, falling to the ground in hundreds of pieces.

The police, stunned by the assistance, by the appearance of a real, live Hero, didn't quite know what to do.

"I suggest getting dumpsters on site fast; we don't know if it can regenerate," she called to the nearest one, motivating them to move and do just that, to contain the pieces of the now inert alien.

Di turned the bike then and took off in another direction, with them focused on clean up, but stayed in the area. When government helicopters came into play, she was sure it was done, and headed home.

+++

"You made the news, Little Miss," Dinah said over the phone, as Di signed for another delivery to get her shop up and running. "But apparently there were some other attacks of strange aliens. It's not just that handsome fella in the red and blue and yellow now. There's others out there."

"Yeah, I saw the paper this morning. Not sure where the reporter was that snapped the shot of me, but I was intent on other things."

"You get used to it, honey, and you often won't see the photographers. Brave men… and women… that take up photojournalism are good at getting their shots and staying out of the way."

Di smiled and felt a joy that her mother was starting to openly share the little things like that. "I don't suppose you can come give me a hand this evening? I've almost got everything ready to open next week."

"I will, Little Miss. Be glad to."

"Thank you, mama."

+++

The whirlwind adventure to get to and stop the alien attack in Florida was the beginning of something bigger than Di had expected. She was still wrapping her head around the concept of a new Green Lantern and a new Flash. It was a little easier to cope with Martian Manhunter and Aquaman… and then Di was laughing at herself. It wasn't like she was a new costume; she'd already had a few admirers ask when she found the fountain of youth.

Using her mama's costume, and looking so much like her was having an effect.

She set a place where Flash or Green Lantern could pick her up for future encounters, and headed back home, still bubbling with the joy of working with others close to her own age, still learning the ropes, and what it meant to have their own team.

The euphoria was carrying her through her opening day, with customers coming in and out, very few buying anything, but curious about the new flower shop. A few sales happened, with a bouquet of a new mother being the happiest purchase and one boy of about eight coming in to buy a single rose for his mother making Di smile.

She was just getting ready to close up when a well-dressed blond came in, clean-shaven and looking for all the world like he knew the world was his.

His face was one Dinah already knew, though, as she followed the society pages, all the better to know where the corruption started.

Oliver Queen, magnate of the local arms factory, was high on her list of suspects for such, in spite of the humanitarian efforts around Star City his company used as a tax write-off. He was, if anything, even more in the local papers with some grandstanding event than that fop Bruce Wayne had been in Gotham.

"May I help you?" she asked, doing her level best to keep her tone even and friendly as expected.

"Got anything that says 'sorry I missed dinner'?" he asked her, but the roguish smile had her pitying whomever was on the other side of this purchase.

"I'm sure I can find something to fit the need. Are there colors or allergies to avoid?"

"I don't think so?" The man looked all around the shop. "You're new here? I thought this place had been empty a while. Glad to see it though; it's on the way to the office."

"I just opened up on this side of town," Di agreed, finding an arrangement that should work for his needs, and adjusting it slightly. 

"Accent sounds East Coast," he added, following her to the counter once she emerged from the displays.

"And yours sounds rich," she said, to shut down the probing. He didn't take offense, just shrugged a shoulder. 

"Means I can afford to say I'm sorry when I mess up and forget something, doesn't it?" he asked cheerfully, pulling out a credit card for her. She punched in the price, and pulled the card imprint machine over, running the sale quickly.

"A word of advice, Mister Queen? Most people would rather have the experiences with their partners than a pretty arrangement commemorating the loss of it," she told him.

"When I have a partner, I'll keep that in mind," he told her, winking. "This is for my receptionist, who put a lot of work into getting a business dinner lined up for me, and then I missed it."

Di tried hard not to flush for her assumptions, and just pushed the slip over for him to sign, along with his credit card.

"Sorry; in this business, we get a lot of repeat apology purchases."

"No offense taken, Miss. Appearances are easy to believe, when you only have half a story after all." He took the arrangement and left then, allowing her to start shutting down for the day.

+++

With a visible threat now, the rogues and aliens and inter-dimensional beings started coming out of the woodworks. Di had known they were there, had watched all her life as the JSA tried to deal with them quietly, but the pressure had been building.

The JSA actually fully retiring had not done much more than make them all cautious, thinking it was a trap in the making. New targets like Superman and the Justice League meant new and daring plans to be rid of the costumed do-gooders.

Di found that she loved it, being able to actually fully embrace who she was, and learning how to use her tricks, her skills, alongside other heroes.

The Flash, more than any of the others, really drew her in. She knew she had to be careful, knew he had a fiancee but it … felt so good to be recognized as an asset by a man that led so competently. She could take or leave Green Lantern and his brashness, while she found Aquaman sweet, and still wasn't fully sure of Martian Manhunter and his caution with them all.

But Flash? Flash was nearly everything she respected in a man, and she wondered if she'd ever meet someone like him for herself.

+++

Canary whirled away from one threat to see Green Lantern trapped in the grip of the giant alien thing, and drew in a deep breath for a Cry. This whole yellow thing was absolutely ludicrous for a weakness, but it was what it was. She hit the thing in its midsection, below the struggling man, and was gratified to see its grip weaken enough for Lantern to escape it. She turned —

"Canary, watch out!" 

She only half-heard it before a glancing blow from one of the automatons helping the alien clubbed her across her ribs, and she couldn't breath, couldn't get her balance from spin it put her in. She needed to get her defenses up, needed to protect herself.

The 'thwip' of an arrow sailing past her turned into a static discharge, and she saw as the automaton she had been clobbered by went down with an arrow in its neck joins, still arcing electricity.

It seemed Green Arrow, the menace from her own town, had joined the party, and had saved her. She could not have been less thrilled if she had tried. She did not want to have to tell him thanks — and then she saw one of the other automatons way too close to him, sucking in a short breath and Crying sharply at it to make it fall down.

"Nice song, little bird," Green Arrow said in that particular tone that made her want to knock his stupid hat off his head.

"Nice pointy sticks," she retorted with a hand flick at the one he had downed off of her. She then focused back on the fight, concentrating on the automatons while Flash and Green Lantern worked on the two aliens. Aquaman and Martian Manhunter weren't here, so maybe it wasn't so bad that Green Arrow had dropped in to help.

"So," Green Arrow began, once the aliens were both down, secured by nets and constructs alike, "any chance of a date for that daring rescue?" he asked Canary, insufferable smile plastered all over his face.

She leveled a look at him that could have frozen boiling water. "If you'll remember, I took one off of you too, so I'd say we're calling it even. And no. I'd sooner date a robot than you."

"I'm hurt," Green Arrow answered that, before he wandered over to where Green Lantern was. "What about you, Sky Jockey? Want to hit up that little bar in Coast, and have a few brews, watch a fight?"

"Sounds like a plan, Robin Hood, soon as the government shows up to deal with these kooks."

+++

Di looked up as the bell jingled, and tried hard not to show any irritation. If she had known that her new shop was this close to the main offices for Queen Industrial, she might have reconsidered. Maybe that was why the price had been low?

Also, what Chairman of the Board did his own flower shopping? He'd been in here at least three times since she opened.

"What is it today, Mister Queen?" she asked him, keeping the annoyance at the local fat cat in her head, not her voice. He came over to the counter, charming smile in place, and… Di saw the make-up around his eyes, hiding bruises, she would bet. She'd had to do that more than a few times. 

"Actually, Miss Lance," he began, "I came to ask if you do a catered event."

It would be a lot of money, but oh so much work to take on something catered. Di wondered if she could squeeze it all into place without the Justice League needing her. Maybe she could hire a temp to help? Depending on what he needed, that might very well be how she had to go with it.

"Do you have a proposal so I can look it over? I'd need to know people count, venue, theme…" she ticked off, deciding she would risk taking it. A strong enough cushion in her bank account might help, given the expenses of keeping her motorcycle repaired, buying new material for her costumes, and she really wanted to see about more martial arts lessons.

Oliver Queen reached into his jacket packet, pulling out a crisply folded paper and passed it over, which Di opened, and found a sketched out room, with table and seating clearly marked on it with who would be present.

"Greens and yellows would be appreciated, with whatever accent colors you need to use? As it the event is in honor of the local hero, Green Arrow, and all his hard work protecting us."

It was all Di could do to not bridle at that, given that Green Arrow was a flashy kind of guy that showed up to the big things… and didn't seem to know Star City had an urban decay problem that was targeting the youth and poor or the inner city neighborhoods.

"Seems to me he's not the only one that helps the city out, from what I read and hear on the radio," she said evenly.

"So you think there should be some red in there for that kid running with him lately?" Queen asked. "I guess that would be fair, if they're partners and all."

Now Di was all but seeing red herself, and wanting to punch him in the face to add to whatever the makeup was covering up.

"I hear Black Canary is pretty active in the inner city," she managed to say evenly. "If you want to show appreciation for the heroes of the city, maybe you should include her."

Oliver Queen made a dismissive sound. "I think she gets enough adulation on the national scene, doing that whole League thing."

"Oh, well, I suppose that completely makes up for her risking her life for the little people here in town, the ones Green Arrow doesn't even know about?" she asked sweetly, the anger dripping in the words. "Seriously, Mister Queen. There's not many women out there in the cape scene, and you're going to ignore the one here? Do you expect every woman and girl in the city to just swoon over the two boys playing Robin Hood and not have their own hero to look up to?"

Queen looked down at her, a frankly considering look on his face. "Interesting way to phrase that. You think it matters to any of them, the heroes, that is?"

"It's never going to be about the heroes, when these kind of events happen, Mister Queen," Di said with certainty. "It's for the ones out there, the people like me, maybe even the ones like you, being reminded that some people rise up and keep them safe. It's for the kids that might be facing hard times, and need that little inspiration to grow into the best person they can be. 

"The boys' club of capes makes it hard for the girls to see themselves rising like that… so be careful how you ask me to design this event for you, alright?"

She figured he'd take the paper back and walk out the door after her opinions, but while he did take the paper back, he also picked up the pen for signing credit slips. He made some adjustments, with notes, and then gave it back. 

"Call me up with the price, Miss Lance… and don't undercharge me, you hear? Our heroes need to know they matter… and apparently, so does the public. Number's at the bottom."

He tipped his head to her, and then walked out as she looked at the notes that had been written down.

He wanted clear sets of arrangements that fit each of Star City's three visible heroes… and one that represented the city itself to go in the middle of the event's table.

It made her eyes go a little soft, and she looked after the man getting into his Mercedes outside her shop.

"I swear if you turn out to be just another corrupt businessman fleecing the city, I'll nail you to the wall, Oliver Queen," she whispered, before getting down to the brass tacks of planning the event he wanted. Maybe she could throw him a suggestion for a food caterer, a small in-home business she knew three blocks over from her mother's place…


	5. Test Flight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: loss of family (not by death), strained mentor-student relationship, implied neglect of a minor, awkward relationships

Black Canary used the wall of muscle in front of her as a springboard, the force of her kick-push knocking him back into the dumpster behind him, before she flipped and landed in front of the one trying to get his gun trained on her. She shot a gloved fist out, catching him just to the left of his chin, and he went down, letting her kick the gun under a second dumpster. 

Now there were three, including the wall of muscle, but none of the others had guns. "Boys, don't you want to rethink this and just go home?" she asked nicely.

The big one ran at her for answer, and even as she sidestepped, she knew one of the other two was moving to hit her where she should come up at… and she heard the 'thwip' of an arrow before a net deployed, holding that one back and dropping him to the street, effectively out of action. No further arrow followed, though, letting Black Canary finish off the other two, laying them out. She then got some of the cable ties she carried out and secured the three not coping with a net… while the archer dropped off a fire-escape to go retrieve his gadget, and handle the one he'd dropped.

"I would've handled him," Canary told him as he did.

"No doubt," Green Arrow answered. "But, pretty as you are in motion, I didn't want to risk the third goon being in place before you had." He secured the netted goon with similar ties to what Canary was using, and then wrapped up the net. "Curious if you've got a few minutes, Little Bird. We seem to have gotten off on a bad foot, and … I kind of want to change that."

She looked over at him, and he wasn't leering or even doing that charming thing. He looked serious.

"Bike's two alleys down," she said, pointing, before she started removing weapons from the goons, a couple of knives and a small sap-sucker, putting them with the gun she retrieved in an impervious evidence bag for the police. A siren was growing closer, so she popped the flare she had started using for cases like this, and then hurried back to the motorcycle and … Green Arrow. 

"Figured I had better wait for you before I got on. She's a beauty, ya know?" he said, appreciating the motorcycle with honesty.

"Thanks for waiting," she said, before disarming the electric trap on it. "I hate the smell of electrified people."

He chuckled, and then waited for her to settle on it, before climbing up behind her, showing he knew how to balance and not upset the rider as she took off for a diner they could sit in without much comment.

+++

Black Canary settled in the booth with her back to the door, a concession to the archer's field of view. It would let her keep an eye on the passage to the kitchen and restrooms, as she knew thugs often went to the back before coming up to rob a place.

"So, why did you want to talk to me?" she asked him, after the waitress, without batting an eye, brought over waters and took an order from them.

"Like I said back there, we got off wrong with each other," Green Arrow told her. "We both run in this city, and we've got different approaches to it. Might be… we should try and understand how each other works, to do that better."

She looked at him with his stupid little hat and eyes reaching out to her so seriously through the mask he wore and couldn't actually laugh. She nodded, taking a deep breath to center herself. "Okay. Maybe I don't really get the way you operate, and you don't get me… but we are both trying to get this city safer in our own ways.

"So, yes. We should." 

Arrow smiled at her for that, then sat back so their plates could be set down between them. When the waitress left, he leaned forward again while she tried one of her fries, juggling it and blowing on it when it proved very hot.

"You have a knack for neighborhood level clean up that doesn't usually leave it open to a turf war. I want to know how to do that. And… I've studied the top side of the problem a while. I could tell you where the dirt rolls downhill from."

The offer intrigued her a lot. She managed to eat the fry finally and then picked up her burger to take a bite, but she nodded at him to show she was considering it. 

"I wouldn't mind help getting to know that kind of thing, and I can show you the power pattern I marked out among the gangs here," she told him after finishing that first bite. "As to the power vacuum thing… you'd need to learn to understand why the people I kick off on wind up in those lives to start with."

His head tipped a little, and the smile widened a bit, but he nodded. "I'm more than willing to listen, Canary… and maybe see about working with you when my sidekick is off playing with the other ones like him."

Canary watched the curve of his mouth, the shift in his perception of her… and almost lost her composure.

Well, this was going to be a very interesting dance, she decided. If she had placed him, as she thought he had placed her, it was going to get a little sticky.

Who knew that billionaires could, and would, risk themselves for their cities?

+++

It was a few weeks before Queen wandered back into her shop. Di had run into him twice since then on the streets, but neither of them had said a word about their mutual revelation. For Di's part, she wasn't going to confirm or deny unspoken suspicions.

She didn't know what Queen was doing with his ideas.

"Have to run, Mama. Customer," she said as she made eye contact with him. The one catering job had led to a couple of other jobs, from clients of Q.I. She could not afford to do anything but be attentive, when it meant more money to support her nightlife. "Yes, Mama. Love you too." She hung up at last, and smiled at him as he reached the counter. "What can I do for you today, Mister Queen?"

"Call me Ollie for a change?" he invited. "I mean, I feel like I'm in here enough to be a regular, Miss Lance."

"Hmm, yes, but as a contractor of my services, I think a little formality is warranted," she countered.

"So what time do I have to show up to warrant a little less formality?" he tried instead.

She shook her head, but it was with a smile and light laugh. "Mister Queen, seriously. I just got off a phone call with my mother for you; how can I help you?"

He looked around the shop, which was empty, and then back at her, his face actually going serious. "Have lunch with me? I can even go for it, bring it back."

Di let her surprise show. Was this his way of trying to confirm who she was?

"There's a Thai place on the corner two blocks up," she said, deciding that she had better find out the full game, or it might bite her in the butt the next time they had to work together. "They make a shrimp and pineapple curry I like."

He gave her a dazzling smile for her answer. "See you in a jiffy then." He turned and left, going back to the … hmm, that was a Jaguar today. Seriously, any other woman would probably be over the moon to have a rich bachelor paying close attention. 

Di just hoped that she got through lunch without being too rude, or with too many worries over just what Oliver Queen expected with what he knew about her.

+++

Di had set up tea a few minutes before Queen came back with food for them both… and then some. 

"Don't worry about the leftovers; my ward can eat me out of house and home, so he'll polish them off. Thought you might want to try a few other things, and I hadn't had some of what they offered," he said breezily, setting everything out on the small table just inside the little office/workroom behind the till.

"Are you always so extravagant?" she asked, pouring two cups of tea as he laid things out.

"Yes," he told her, looking over with a lopsided grin for her. She shook her head at him, but sat down, closest to the opening into the shop, so she could respond if a customer came in.

"I feel sorry for your accountants."

"Don't worry; I pay more than minimum wage and I give paid lunches," he said, jokingly, but she knew it was truth. A little digging went a long way. From business reports, Queen ran the front facing part of the business here in Star City, while leaving the munitions factories to their managers.

She took a few bites of the offerings onto her plate, and began sampling once he had served himself. She was still trying to guess his angle, but waited to see if he gave her any further clues.

"Are you happy here in Star City?" he asked at last, which was pretty far from any subject she had expected.

"I've gotten used to it," she admitted.

"Gotham, right? I finally placed the accent. Got a buddy, real rich kid with issues, out that way."

She wondered which of Gotham's Old Money he had been rubbing shoulders with, but she couldn't very well deny the accent.

"Not one of that crowd. I've got the honest people's accent," she said. "But yes, Gotham."

"You didn't actually answer me, though. Are you happy?"

Di shrugged. "What's not to be happy about? I have a business that is managing to stay in the black, a place to live, and I get to volunteer to work with at-risk kids on the days I'm closed."

"Those are things and pastimes," he countered. "And not about you at all."

"Alright, if you're going to poke me, I poke back. You answer your own question, and I will."

"Ooh, tricky. Must be a Gotham thing," Queen answered. He then met her eyes and gave her his full attention on this question. "Mostly I am. I've got a great kid to help raise up, I'm turning my company into a philanthropy effort, shifting its focus toward making life better, instead of being a death merchant, and I have a pretty fulfilling hobby."

"But?" Di asked, hearing something niggling in the background of it.

"It's all great, but I kind of what like to share it with someone," he told her.

Despite herself, the way he said it while looking at her made her heart race. A year ago, she could barely stand his presence, but the more she had learned, the more her objections fell among the innate distrust of the rich.

"Guy like you must have plenty of opportunities. Society page certainly thinks so," she said.

"What does the press ever know? They're paid shills of the rising oligarchy in this country."

"Hey, I've known some pretty good newsmen in my life!" she protested, before laughing and nodding. "But yes, I know the press has been sliding more and more to Hearst style journalism on behalf of their owners."

"Knew you were a smart woman," Queen said, and it wasn't hollow. There was honest admiration in his voice for her.

Di smiled warmly at him, found herself meaning it. When was the last time a guy had spoken like that about her… and not been taken already? She felt a flare at Flash all over again, then pushed it down. He really hadn't known how to handle being attracted to her in addition to the lady of his life, she'd realized. She'd also recognized half of the attention for her had been a longing to be able to share who he was fully.

She was pretty sure they had crossed that bridge, like her own parents, by now. After all, the couple of times her path had crossed the woman's since then, she had seemed like she was too smart to stay hoodwinked.

"Mister Queen… Oliver," she said at his look that was part hurt-puppy and part playful rogue, "I don't know what I might have said or done that we're having this talk, but I'm not in a position to help fix up your love-life."

"Not looking to having it fixed, Pretty Bird," he said, voice dropping and oh how she had not needed to learn he could make it flutter like that. And…

"Pretty bird?" she asked, fighting one last time to keep the pretense of a secret identity.

"Prettiest and strongest one I've ever met," he said, reaching out to run his fingers over her knuckles. "What do you say, Dinah Lance? Give me a chance to shoot straight with you?"

Could she do this? Could she juggle her life as an independent small business owner against dating the richest man in Star City and still be true to her calling as a hero? Could he manage it?

"I'm not going to have a lot of time to invest," she warned him. "I have to have this business. It's part of who I always meant to be. I'm certainly not going to cut into my volunteer time." She liked the way his face softened and he nodded at that.

"I'll be honest in that I can't understand the work thing; I was born to what I have, and never had to learn that part of life. I want to try, but that's like a wolf trying to understand a sheep. Base class difference," he said, again surprising her.

"You're pretty self-aware in some spots," she said to that.

"Had a massive wake-up to reality a few years back. Been trying to make good on it ever since," he admitted. "Part of why I took up my own hobbies."

She opened her hand under his fingers gentle caresses. "I think, Oliver, I am looking forward to learning about those kind of things."

"I'm glad of that," he told her, before lifting her hand to kiss the back of it.

It might be the oddest match in the world, the weapons mogul and the flower shop girl, but Di was willing to give it a chance.

+++

Ollie walked in through the service door, and was stunned to hear the television on, down in the work room. His ears tuned in fully to see what horrible thing had happened in the world.

" — in an ongoing story. From witnesses, the team was missing several key members, but of those that were there, none have been found. Sightings of a giant wolf and Viking shield maidens have not yet been confirmed. More as the story develops."

The volume was cut back then, and Ollie walked in to see his girlfriend with another brunette woman leaning on her shoulder, sobbing softly.

"I should have been with them, should have…"

"Shh, Mama, shh…" Di was saying, her eyes coming up to spot Ollie and make a very small smile at him. "We don't know what will happen. It's them! They do impossible things all the time!"

The older woman, whom Ollie had not yet met despite dating Di for months now, shook a little but pulled back, using her handkerchief. 

"I just… I know Wesley had been agitated. I should have gone."

"Mama, hush that. If you had gone, if the ones that were not there had gone… who would be here to help my team figure out things? Who would be watching over those kids using our old hangout? Stop fussing about not being there, and focus on what you can do. 

"I mean, Aunt Molly? Aunt Joan? They need you to be strong."

Ollie heard the bell jangle, and waved at Dinah, going to take care of it, if he could, so she and her mother could stay right there, squeaking past the pair, which startled the elder woman for a moment. 

As the customer only wanted to buy a small, pre-made arrangement, Ollie was actually able to handle the transaction alone. It might be amusing to see if a tabloid wound up with a story of riches to rags because he was working the till of a flower shop, but right now, he knew his girlfriend needed support. Never mind that she was supporting the hell out of her mother… he was pretty sure she was going to be a wreck too with all her stories about the JSA.

"Hey, Di. Ms Drake, I presume?" Ollie asked as he came back in.

"Yes… you must be Oliver Queen," the elder woman said, and now that he could clearly see her face, it was easy to see how people kept mistaking Black Canary for an immortal, for being the original one. The mother was as stunning as the daughter, and did not look near as old as he thought she had to be.

"I hope Di hasn't been filling your ears too much about me," he said pulling a crate up to the table to sit on it. "And I'm sorry, about whatever has happened to your friends. I'd like to lend help, if I can?"

"There's not much— "

"You can take a vacation," Di said firmly. "Let Oliver send you out to Molly or Joan, and just take some time to support them. I can take your inventory and sell it for you, so we don't lose too much that way."

Ollie made plans to find a way to buy out the inventory in question. Maybe he'd have Di decorate the local hospital for some civic holiday… as soon as he found one.

"It seems so — "

"Ma'am," Ollie cut her off, just to stop her from working her up against the idea. "Di seems dead-set against me spoiling her. And your friends do need someone to lean on, from the sound of it. Please let me fly you out to wherever you need to go."

"Mama, it's best that way," Di insisted.

"Well, alright." Dinah took a deep breath, and then stood. "I should go get things in order, then. See who is where and what the idea is at this time on where to meet up."

"Do you want me to drive you back?"

"No, young man. I can take a taxi just as I did to come over," Dinah told him. "But the thought is appreciated."

Di stood up and saw her mother out, waiting with her for the taxi, then came back in… and fell into Ollie's arms almost instantly. 

"Thank you. And thank heavens you came in when you did," she whispered, letting him hold her close. "I'm so scared, Oliver."

"I only caught the tale end of that news report," he admitted. "But… the JSA is missing?"

"Yes. Not all of them, or at least we don't think so? Based on witnesses who saw the events happen," Di told him. "That might turn out to be false, but now Mama is working toward thinking, she'll find a way to get in touch with all the families, and confirm or deny the losses." Her fingers knotted in his shirt at the idea of losing most of her extended family this way.

He brought his hand up along her head, leaving the other on her hip to hold her close. "Oh, Pretty Bird," he murmured softly. "I'm here with you. And I'll see that your mother gets to where she can do some good, to help her focus."

"Thank you, Oliver," she murmured, closing her eyes as she let him hold her.

+++

Ollie had gotten used to their dates ending at her place, whether it was dinner and a mugging that was stopped or them coming back from a League fight together and spending time playing doctor. Literally, sometimes, as Di had a steady hand with stitches and she didn't always duck in time to avoid damage.

When a fancy dinner out had them closer to his place, though, Di leaned over across the gap between their seats, and kissed his cheek before whispering in his ear.

"Do we really need to drive all the way back to my place?" she murmured.

Ollie's heart revved as fast as the engine, it felt like, but he tried hard to keep it in check, to just look over and raise an eyebrow. "You sure?"

"Very." 

Her hand sliding along his thigh added impetus, and he took the shortest, most direct route from the restaurant to his home. Sometimes, he felt like he had robbed the cradle with Di; she was a full thirteen years younger than him.

And then there were nights like tonight, when she reminded him that she was no shy maiden, no nervous virgin. From the beginning, once they'd decided to try dating, she had been more than his match in the sensual ring.

He soon had them pulling down his long drive, her hand having kept playing over his leg and arm, just enough to stoke interest, and not enough to interfere with his ability to drive safely. When he came around to hand her out of the car, she flowed up against him and kissed him a good, long minute before she was willing to let him walk her to the door. He wrapped his arm around her waist, and placed a kiss on her temple. Her hand tucked in his back pocket, while she used the other to rest on his chest, simmering with desire for a continuation of their night.

As he fumbled with the keys for the door, he leaned down to kiss her again, and was thoroughly enchanted by the way she nipped his lip when he broke it. He looked at the key to make it work quicker — 

— and the door swung open to show his sidekick, all kitted up for a night out on patrol.

"Umm, Speedy…" Ollie said, frowning and rubbing the back of his neck. Di moved away from him, going from on fire to a chill wind in the space of a second, he could tell.

"Did you forget the day?" Speedy asked, voice a little petulant like only a teenager's could be, and that added a little more ice to the atmosphere around Di.

"I must have, Champ," he said apologetically.

"Well, I guess it doesn't matter," Speedy said, moving out of the doorway.

"Actually," Di broke in. "Why don't you call me a taxi, Speedy, while Arrow goes to change?"

"Di—"

"No, really. I need a cab," she said, not letting Ollie finish that protest. "Do you mind, Speedy?"

The boy looked slightly ashamed under his domino and silly hat, but then he nodded. "I'll get you a good one, Canary."

"I appreciate it," she said, before she leaned against the door frame. "Go on, Oliver. Your partner is waiting."

Ollie gave himself over to the disaster he'd somehow made, and went in to get ready for a night's patrol.

+++

Di looked up as Oliver came in with chocolates. She just shook her head, and went back to making her weekly order, ignoring him when he came behind her and dropped a kiss on top of her head. She was going to let him stew for at least a few minutes, going so far as to telefax her order in before she finally looked at him.

"We agreed, Oliver, dates were for nights that he was out with friends, or away at the kids' team things," she said with a little ire in her voice.

"I know. I thought he was due back tonight, forgot… forgot he'd come home early because of the date."

"An anniversary of his? Or shared between you?"

Oliver nodded, grimacing. "The day we met, actually."

"Oliver… he's an up and coming hero. You need to focus on him, give him all the support he needs! He can't fly high if you don't!"

"I try, Dinah, I really do," he said, sinking into the seat beside hers. "He's a good kid, solid in all the tricks! I just… sometimes I forget things. But I make them up to him!"

Di made a small face, before she shook her head. "I think you and I need to take a step back. He is still young, and he needs you."

"Pretty Bird?"

Oliver's hurt tone and face said so much, and she almost relented. 

"I'm not saying we're over, Ollie. You can come by for lunch, and I'll partner you or both of you as needed, but… I think we both need to step back, and let you focus on his training for a while. No more dates by night for a while. Give him a chance to get over the hurt you accidentally caused him."

"I — no, you're right. You have a habit of being right." He took a deep breath and made to stand up. "I should probably run back by the office, and be home when he gets in today."

Di stood up and moved to where she could kiss his cheek, a chaste offering of friendship for now. "I just don't ever want to be the reason he comes to harm, and he still needs a lot of polish on what he knows.

"A lost or dead sidekick is not something you want to go through, Oliver. I promise you that. Sandman was never the same after things happened with Sandy," she told him. "Go, take care of him, and I'll see you around."

He nodded, then leaned down enough to kiss her forehead, not trying to push his luck. "See you around," he agreed before leaving her there. Once the Mercedes had pulled away, Di sat back in her seat and put her head in her hands, letting herself cope with what she had done.

It was the only right thing to do, though, because Speedy had to come first.


	6. Stretching Her Wings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Notes: Relationship infidelity discussions, suspected infidelity

Taking a step back from Oliver left Di with more time on her hands, again. Even though she always went when the League called, it had gotten big enough that she wasn't always running from the shop to a crisis somewhere in the world.

She picked up an assistant trainer position at a local martial arts school, teaching Judo, to fill her evenings. She loved her art, loved helping kids, especially the girls, learn how to defend themselves. It also gave her a chance to meet others who were good in styles she had not yet learned, adding to her repertoire of tricks to keep others safe.

She did see Green Arrow some, and Speedy too, but apparently they were hanging out more on the East Coast, with Batman and Robin. She had suspected that her idea of backing off would lead to a cool down with Oliver. If he needed distance to do that, so be it.

She didn't expect to add to that distance, until an elegantly written invitation to go to Hong Kong arrived. It was signed by Sensei, the man that had taken an interest in her martial art skills as a girl. Di decided it was time to buckle down and get serious about her skills, and hired a pair to work both her shop and her mother's, so her mother could keep an eye on the management side of both shops. 

They weren't hurting for money, at either location, but Di wanted her business-savvy mother to keep it that way for her extended absence. She took a break from the League, got her passport, and went to Hong Kong to see just how good she could get.

+++

It had been over six months since Oliver Queen had laid eyes on the Pretty Bird that he just couldn't forget. Trips by the shop had not gotten him anything but polite friendliness from her mother, and no one on the League seemed to know where she was off to.

She certainly didn't have a sidekick to spread gossip to Speedy, which left one archer high and dry in his efforts to rekindle what they had started on. Surely now that Speedy was making a name for himself with the Teen Titans, showing how solid a hero he could be, she might give him another chance?

Only, how could he convince her of that if she was nowhere to be found?

Glumly, he decided he was going to have to put her down as one that got away, and focused on settling fully back into life in Star City. Running around in Gotham and Opal and Hub had been fun, but he was hearing rumors from the Board that his company was under siege. That meant being CEO Queen by day, and Green Arrow by night.

The gangs, though, had gotten bolder, as he had been gone more than not, and Black Canary had also been away from the city. He didn't know if he'd just misjudged how close to one of the more violent gangs' territories they were, or if it had spread in his absence, but both he and Speedy were struggling to stay above the tide, being chased into tighter and tighter quarters.

He was trying to figure out how they were going to get out of this one when he heard the edge of a Cry, and five of the toughs flew back to buy them room.

Or, at least, in theory? Before the reverberations of the Cry ended, the leather clad, fishnetted heroine was down among the rest, an absolute whirlwind of fists, feet, and throws that was staggering to watch. Arrow and Speedy hastily regrouped, fitting net and bolo arrow into place, taking gang members out of the fight from the edges, careful of their ally's position. 

They got them all down at last, and tied up for the cops, then retreated to the rooftops, with Speedy giving Arrow a sidelong look about the Canary. She pretended not to notice the nudges and small gestures as she went to the edge of the roof to look over things, waiting until the sirens got close to move back to where they were.

"How are the two of you doing when you're not getting in over your heads?" she asked them, a smile at Speedy that was sincere. He almost stammered as he answered, because she was really pretty and she had walked away just to give him and Arrow space to get even better as partners.

Granted, going to Gotham so frequently hadn't actually helped with that much, since he'd spent a lot of his time with Robin, but the intent was nice.

"Pretty good," he got out, while Arrow was sizing her up, noticing just how she was filling out the … new? yes, new… bustier and fishnets. She'd always been in solid shape, but there was a new level to it now.

"Looked damn fine down there, Pretty Bird," he said in a warm voice, while he hoped things might be on track to go back to how they had been. She turned enough to meet his eyes, and gave him a sultry smile.

"I'd hope so," she said in a self-satisfied voice that left Arrow weak in the knees. "I should probably get back to my bike, though. See you both around?"

"You betcha!" Speedy told her. "Pretty sure you'll get tired of Arrow's mug, you'll be seeing so much of him." There. Was that enough to encourage her to pick it up with his mentor if she wanted to?

She laughed merrily and came over to his side, shoulder to shoulder to lean in to whisper in his ear. "Only if you're okay with it, Speedy," she said softly. "But I wouldn't mind, if you two are solid. I'll try to be careful with your time."

Speedy swallowed hard, and then nodded to her, which satisfied her and she moved on.

"What was all that about?" Arrow asked, once Canary had moved off their roof.

Speedy grinned at his mentor, and shook his head. "Our secret!"

+++

"I'm starting to think my boy has a crush on you," Ollie said, making Di look up at seeing him having slipped in behind the other customer that had opened the door. She shook her head with a smile, then jerked her head to the workroom. He went on that way, and she concentrated on the two paying customers.

It took almost half an hour to satisfy them both, and then she went in with him. "Hello, Oliver."

He stood there a long moment, just looking at her. She was in jeans and a blouse and her dark hair was in a new short style, and she looked absolutely beautiful to him. She could see that in the way he softened his stance, in how quickly he came to stand right in front of her, reaching for both of her hands.

She let him take them, and tilted her face up just so… and then he was kissing her, slow and sweet and without anything but the quiet affection of a long separation.

"I have missed you," he said very softly, once the kiss ended, and she tucked in along his chest, wrapping her arms behind him.

"So much for Playboy Queen?" she teased him. "I missed you too, Oliver. I just… well. It's done. Let's try this again, and be more careful about balancing things?"

"I want that," he told her seriously. "There hasn't been any girl worth looking twice at, when I could only compare them to you."

She laughed at that, then reached up and ran a hand through his hair before dragging his head down to kiss him deeply. She let him feel how much she had missed him in that kiss, eliciting a moan out of them both.

They were crazy over each other, even after so long apart, and that just made Di feel better for having taken the break. This was real, and it could last, if they just took it slow enough.

+++

They were laying in bed, covers up around their waists, when Ollie gave a long sigh. Di shifted to an elbow, leaning up so she could see his face better.

"Still thinking over the idea of seeing America with Hal?"

"Yeah. It's summer, so Speedy can jet off to the Titans more, or go hang out with Robin in Gotham. The Bat doesn't seem to mind him much," Ollie said. "I just… well, you said it a few different ways, but basically, we're doing this for the little guys.

"We need to see it. It's one reason I keep finding other practical applications for my company, easing away from what the Queen name was in the past."

Di nodded, and tucked in along his side again. "It might be eye-opening for you both," she agreed. "Make sure Speedy is good, and do it. The city, and I, will be here when you get back."

Ollie made a low rumble of pleasure at that. "Got an old friend that knows us both who might be able to check in on Speedy a bit."

"One of these days, Oliver, we need to see about a proper meeting between he and I," Di told him. "He's so important to you, and I like his style. Even if he is a smart-mouth and then some."

"Like you're not, Pretty Bird? You egg him on out there with the way you throw the words around."

She laughed, then kissed his chest. "I figure a Canary has to sing, and my Cry only goes so far for riling them up."

"Fairly far, mind you," he said of her Cry, raw pride in her for the way she used that devastating attack in her fighting style, using the sonics that pierced and disoriented, as well as the actual physical push of it.

"Been trying to master it a long time, Ollie," she said to that. "I can't let it get away from me, or for it to hurt people permanently. I mean, you are the same, with how careful you use your arrows to set the situation, more often than not."

"It's still amazing, so hush and let me marvel at you, oh my Pretty Bird." He rolled to his side so he could face her. "What do you think of Hal?"

"Arrogant, pushy, mouthy… and one of the best guys I could hope to have at our backs in a League fight," she answered him. "I didn't click with him as quickly as I did Barry, but I do like him."

He nodded, then leaned in and stole a kiss. "He thinks you're the pushy one."

"That's because I am. But I'm not the one that declared I was the leader of a rookie team of heroes, without realizing the other three had picked a leader already."

Ollie chuckled at that. "He mentioned. Said you and Arthur set him straight pretty darn quickly too."

She nodded, then moved to capture a kiss of her own, sliding her hand over the bare skin of his side and hip. "Barry has the better head for it, no matter that he keeps trying to convince Superman to take the lead. He's got a tactical sense about what we face that Superman will never have, mostly because he started off as just a human.

"He knows the limitations of humanity, through and through. So does Superman… but not as fully."

"Hadn't thought of it that way, but you're right." Ollie traced a finger down her arm. "Alright. Enough talking about other men. I think I need my mouth for other things." He grinned lecherously at her, and she laughed, before settling to let his mouth do those other things.

+++

Di had been holding off on remodeling the shop for some time. When Ollie suggested she join them for part of the trip, she decided it was as good a time as any. She left the plans with a team of workers that had been suggested by Joan Garrick, ones that had helped do a number of discreet projects over the years. They were some relation to her uncle Al, Di thought, but she wouldn't swear to it.

That handled, with a promise from her mother to check on progress, Di took off for where Ollie and Hal were learning just what America really looked like.

"Hey, look who it is!" Hal greeted, as the big motorcycle pulled up beside the beat-up truck they were using for the trip. He took in the practical jeans, the boots, the jacket, and just shook his head. "You know, one of these days, I'm going to see you dolled up and not even recognize you. You do biker chick pretty well."

"I should hope so, Hal. Been riding half my life, ever since Daddy bought me a little motorbike to get around Gotham." She patted the tank on the Harley. "Never really thought Mama would give me her girl, but I try to take as good of care of her as Mama did."

"And you do," Ollie said, coming around the truck as Di was setting the kickstand, loving how easy she made handling that beast look. 

Hal was closer and claimed a hug from her, grinning at the quick peck on the cheek she added. Then she turned and that was certainly no peck that she greeted Ollie with. She lingered in the kiss, hands cupping Ollie's neck until she was fully satisfied.

"It's only been four days," Hal mock-complained while she unstrapped her saddle bags to carry to camp.

"Hmm, some of us miss our girls like crazy when we are apart," Ollie told his best friend. "Besides, she only just took me back last month."

Hal leaned over to Di with a conspirator's pose. "Why'd you go and do that?"

Di laughed, bright and musical, before swatting playfully at him. "He's good to me."

She missed the look the two men exchanged, as she bent down to adjust how her left boot was sitting, now that she wasn't riding. Ollie gave a small shake of his head and Hal let it go, before she had straightened.

"Alright, let me see if either of you actually passed Boy Scouts one oh one," she said with a tease in her voice, taking Ollie's arm so they could guide her to the camp. 

"Let me guess; you were a Brownie?" Hal asked, wondering if the know-it-all streak had worn off on his longtime friend and teammate.

"Nope. But Daddy liked to get us out of the city now and then, go camping up in the Watchung mountains." 

"Sounds like fun," Ollie told her, having learned that most of her happiest memories involved her father. He… didn't actually have much in the way of good memories with either of his parents. And he shied away from talking about their deaths, given that he would always blame himself for hesitating.

They made it back to camp, and Di looked around with approval, before setting the bags down near the tent. 

"Half-expected to find the pair of you holed up in a hotel, to be honest," she said, catching the faint flicker of unease on Ollie's face at her words. "What?"

"Nothing, Pretty Bird. Just trying not to touch the assets while we do this," he said easily enough.

She frowned a little, remembering he'd gotten rid of his sports cars during the time they had been on a break, only keeping a coupe that was by no means a luxury car. She let it go, though, and looked around the park they were camping in. 

"I bet dinner is chili?"

Hal laughed at her and nodded. "At least it makes the beans edible when he gets hold of them."

"My chili is delicious. No matter which way I make it," Ollie defended, but he was smiling as he said it, loving that they would tease him over his preferred culinary mastery.

"I brought antacids, just in case," she told Hal knowingly, settling in to enjoy the time away from home.

+++

Traveling with the boys was… an experience. At first, Di loved seeing the easy rapport the pair fell into, even when they were arguing over the nuances of whatever situation they had found. 

Slowly, though, Di began to see something around the edges of that. She could not quite place it, not until Ollie anticipated something Hal needed handed to him, just like he would do for her when he stopped in and she was making arrangements. After that, she paid a little more attention, and didn't much care for how things were stacking up.

Only… they really hadn't ever set any rules on who they were, had they?

Di took an afternoon into the town nearest their current camp, wanting to think that over, to see what she needed. Ollie had said no girl could compare. Maybe that was because he needed or, at least, wanted a guy? She put that against her own experiences, knew that no guy would ever really be able to support her in the same way that Selina had. The two things were just too far different from one another. 

Ollie was devoted to her, in his own way. It wasn't like he neglected her when they were a couple, and … maybe she could just ignore this. It might not be anything at all. It might just be how men could be when they were in company they trusted.

She didn't really think so, but she also didn't want to know for certain. She didn't think she was actually being 'the other woman', and she didn't want to rock things with Ollie so close to having taken him back. She'd just leave well enough alone, and deal with the fall out from there.

+++

"You came back early," Dinah said, looking over her daughter. "Not more trouble with your beau, is there?"

Di gave her a full smile, hiding all her suspicions, and shook her head. "Too many boy things, Mama. Decided I wanted to be here."

Dinah gave her a shrewd look, then raised her chin. "Little Miss, you were too excited about getting away again for this to be about boys being boys. Something happened, and it made you want to be safe."

That made Di sigh softly. "Actually, it is boys being boys, and there's some complications, but… I have to choose for myself. Also, this might be the worst thing for you and me to discuss, given things." She got up to tackle rewashing her dishes, now that the plaster work was done in the shop and the dust should be settled.

"He's sleeping with someone else?" Dinah asked in a quiet, astute voice, and Di turned to look at her. At least there was no shame, merely an acceptance of her own culpability in such a thing.

"I don't know that he is," she answered.

Dinah snorted at her. "You are your father's daughter, and you helped him with cases a lot younger than I thought was wise. You'd know the signs. Even leaving aside my indiscretion."

That actually opened the door, and Di came back to sit at the table, taking her mug into her hands. "Why did you, Mama? I know you loved Daddy, and Daddy thought the sun rose and set on your every word! I just… don't understand, maybe, when there was so much love in our lives."

"That love kept us together, Little Miss," Dinah said ruefully. "But it wasn't always enough. Before you came along, when the thrill of being Black Canary was so strong… sometimes I wanted to share that with someone who understood it completely. 

"I never didn't love your father. Larry was everything I needed in a partner at home. The thing with Ted Knight? Was reaching for something outside the normal life, something that was Black Canary being understood at a different level."

The honesty matched up to what Di had been working out in her own head about Ollie. It was something she couldn't give, or something he thought he needed, even though they were crazy about each other.

"I think this, if it is what I think I am seeing, is something like that. Not the sharing hero spaces, but… something outside what I and he have?" Di told her, opening up to work this out for herself. "I love him, Mama. Maybe a forever kind of love, even. And I do not doubt that he loves me just as much, maybe more. I mean… how many men accept a break in the relationship that goes most of the year and then picks right back up just like they were before?"

Dinah shook her head. "It's a hard road to walk, Little Miss. Your father came to know, talked to me, and things … were tense, but he chose to stay. And in time, I stopped straying to Ted. Because of you, because our lives were growing tight, because I wasn't running as much in the wig… lots of reasons.

"But you have to be certain you can share, if you are honestly not going to make this an issue." Dinah reached out and cupped her hands around her daughter's on the warm mug. "I don't want you to be unhappy, or to not have the support you need, when the time comes that things do get rough. So do all the thinking now, and when you choose? Make it stick."

Di smiled, softly, for that advice. "Pretty much what I was wrestling with. I do love him. I do know how rough our lives can get. I'll turn a blind eye; it's not like I know for certain? And hope that he is as happy as he can be, while I make my own happiness with my world and him both."

Dinah squeezed her hands, then pulled back. "You are so much your father's child sometimes, Little Miss. I know so many people see me in you. Hard not to, when we're a before and after picture. But I see Larry in your wisdom, and in how you handle the life that you have."

Di ducked her head under that praise, before she got up and came around the table, hugging her mother tight. "Love you, Mama, for all our ups and downs," she said. "I'm going to keep trying to make you proud, and Daddy too."

"You do, baby girl. So very much."


	7. A Lost Arrow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Notes: drug abuse, neglect of a minor by his guardian, homelessness due to prejudice, fear of AIDS

With Green Arrow gone, there had been an uptick in gang activity, but Black Canary didn't think much on it. She would have liked help from Speedy, but figured he was back East with that team of his, or maybe staying in Gotham with his friend, Robin.

School wouldn't be back in for a bit longer, after all.

She completely put the thought of him aside, as well as thoughts of her boyfriend's possible dalliance, and just focused on making her business run smoothly, on keeping the streets as clean as she could, and helping the League when they called on her. This whole teleporter thing was a nifty trick to get used to, just like something out of the old pulp magazines, and cut down on how long she was away from the store.

She had hired on a young man, a boy that had been kicked out of his home for personal reasons. He was honest with her, and she was glad to have someone she could tap for help, using the excuse that she had to keep an eye on a dear friend in trouble.

It wasn't that far wrong; the League generally only called on her when things were really messy since she had settled into life as a solo hero on the West Coast. 

Her day had gone like any other, with her going up to her apartment after working a full day, putting together arrangements for one of those little old lady events. Her plan was to get some food, change into costume, and go patrol near the harbor for a few hours.

She got her food on a plate when there was a knock on the door that led to the street via a narrow flight of stairs on the outer wall. She quickly went, wondering if Devonte, her shop help, had lost his place in the shelter. She'd put him up for the night, even if it meant not patrolling but —

— Green Lantern was there, looking stressed and carrying a long, lanky half-grown boy with red hair, one who seemed to be trying to curl up in knots as pain wracked him.

"Lantern?!" she asked, even as she held the door wide, then rushed ahead of Hal to clear her couch so the boy could be put down. She looked again, and the body length translated to size standing. "Is that Speedy? What's wrong?"

"Shouldna bother her," the boy ground out. "Should just leave me 'lone. Ollie was right, just a screw-up!"

"Hush," Hal told the boy as he settled him on the couch, where the boy whimpered and curled in tight on himself. Hal then looked at Di. "He's hooked on something, probably heroin," Hal said very quietly. "Ollie… panicked. Threw him out."

"He did **what**?!" Di demanded in a hiss, but she was moving to get an afghan over the boy as he began to shiver. 

Hal ran his hand over his face, then shook his head. "Something, something big, is riding Ollie and his head's not on straight. He's out there now; we both have been since it happened three nights ago, hunting for him, for who got him hooked, all of that."

"Three days? Three days and I'm only just — no, not important. You go, do whatever you need to. I have the boy," Di said, shooing him out the door. She'd deal with her boyfriend's criminal negligence later. Hal left then, and Di looked back at the boy on her couch.

If she remembered the traits of this addiction correctly, they were in for a hard fight, but it was one they would not win unless Speedy really wanted to. She locked the door, sliding the chain and bolt in both into place, then went to do the same with the door that led down into the shop.

Having multiple locks might be the most important thing in slowing Speedy down, if the cravings got bad.

Once she had done that, she came over and knelt beside the couch, reaching to place a hand on the boy's shoulder. "Hey."

He looked at her with clouded green eyes. "You don't have to—"

"Shh, Speedy." She gave him a gentle smile, but it was so sad, full of worry for him. "Do you want to kick this?"

"Told Hal, yeah, do want to." He cringed a little as his guts clenched around a cramp. "Been trying, since Ollie freaked out."

Di took a deep breath, pushing her anger with Oliver down in favor of being support to this boy. "If you want this, I'll help you do it. It is not going to be easy, and you may hate me by the time it is over, but I'm staying with you though it all."

He shook his head. "Could just drop me in a tox unit?"

"Oh hell no, I am not!" She moved her hand up to his cheek, letting it rest there lightly. "I don't know how or why you fell into this, Speedy, but I will help you get clean.

"Speaking of… let's get you through a shower while you can still move? I've got gym clothes that should fit you, but you will feel a little better if you get the streets off of you."

He flinched, and she really didn't want to think about how a boy could have been finding the cash to score heroin. She just didn't. She heard stories, especially from Devonte. And she was going to call the shelter just as soon as Speedy was in the shower, let him know she had hours for him all week, maybe the next.

"Yeah," Speedy said, pushing up, the afghan falling to his side. Di pushed up to her own feet, finding she tucked under his arm pretty easily.

"I think you added an inch or two since I saw you last," she said, guiding him back to her bathroom. "Go on, start your shower, Speedy." She moved to leave, and he caught her hand.

"You sure? This… I saw what I'm in for. You don't even really know me."

Di squeezed his hand. "You have the heart of a hero. You're hurting. And people failed you. I'm not going to do that, and I'm going to see you through this. So get in there and clean up, Speedy, while I find you clothes."

He let go of her hand, turned to go in, and paused. "Roy."

She looked back at him at that quiet introduction. "Dinah. Or just Di."

He nodded and went to get as clean as he could, while she went to dig out the drawstring shorts and oversize tee shirt that both had _Ted Grant's Gym_ emblazoned on them. They'd fit him, if only just, until she could get something better for him.

With the clothes put inside the bathroom, she called the shelter, got Devonte to agree to handle things, then called her mother and asked for a delivery of soups and clothing in an estimate of Roy's size. Those things taken care of, she made a single long-distance phone call to a clinic on the east coast. She could not ask anyone in the community, trying to protect Spee— Roy's privacy, but she could ask Dr Thompkins, who saw things like this all the time.

"Yes, long-distance for Dr Thompkins? Tell her… tell her it's Larry's little girl, and I need to consult. Yes, I'll hold the line." She leaned back on the wall, twirling the cord around her fingers until the doctor was on the other end. "Dr Thompkins… I know, a long time. But right now, I need help. I need to know how to help a boy detox and beat a heroin addiction."

She listened, then gave the woman her telefax number, before hanging up. She'd run down to get the information as soon as she could, but Roy was right.

They were both in for a horrible time.

+++

They were in the bathroom, anything like nudity taboos and personal space forgotten when the cramps moved to the full on nausea and other ailments of the guts. Di had helped him through every heave, managed to clean him up as needed, and just stayed close. Her only concession to the unfamiliar level of bodily discomfort had been to break open a new Renuzit and stick it in the bathroom corner with them.

She was sitting on the tub's edge, stroking his hair, as he leaned over it, thinking it might finally be over. There was certainly nothing left to throw up… or otherwise.

"Should shoot me, or shoot me up, be done with this," Roy said miserably.

"Hmm. Not fond of guns, and really not liking any kind of drugs now, so how about no?" she said. "Let me rinse the tub out again, then you get in and I'll spray you off."

"Feel helpless."

"Good thing for you that you're not," she told him. "Just stick to your resolve… and I'll put you on your butt again if you try to get past me. Because that's not you; it's the drugs."

"Yeah, Di… my butt still isn't liking the tile of this floor, especially at force from you dropping me," he said ruefully. He leaned back, and let her clean the tub, then managed to get in it.

As much shame as he'd felt when things exploded, he'd had to let go of it in the face of her gentle insistence as she took care of him. Now, he just closed his eyes as she sprayed him down, getting all the traces of illness off of him, taking the sour sweat with it.

"Good thing Mama dropped off the clothes so we can try that again?" Di said, voice upbeat, and despite himself, Roy laughed. He then looked up at her with a steadily growing worship at odds with the conviction she would eventually dump him off too. 

"I promise to sit right out in the hall so you can grab a shower too, Di. I'm too weak to do more than crawl anyway." 

She searched his face, then nodded. "A quick one wouldn't go amiss," she agreed. "Alright, into a pair of undies at least, and then you sit out there with the door open, so we can hear each other."

He managed to tumble back out of her tub, not very gracefully, and she wrapped her largest towel around him before going to bring back a pair of underwear. She snorted as she handed them over. 

"Mama's old-fashioned," she explained, as he saw they were boxers with something approaching confusion.

"They'll do, though," he said, slowly making it to his feet to get them on, with her hovering protectively to support him. Once he had them on, and she helped him to the hallway, she gathered comfortable clothes from her room, came back, and started getting cleaned up with the door open.

"Roy, you okay?" she asked, halfway through her shower, and he wanted to choke on the lump rising in his throat. Why did she try so hard? It was so easy to see why Ollie loved her and couldn't let go of her even when he was screwing around with Lantern or the Bat…

"I'm going to be," he vowed, even as they both knew this was far from over.

"You sure are, honey," she said softly back to him.

+++

Di had decided there was no point in him or her sleeping on the couch, especially when she realized that despite his pain, he seemed to crave the little touches on his hair or back. He'd been a little shy about sharing her bed at first, until the cramping hit again, and he just wanted to die.

She bundled him under the covers, got a blanket for herself, and curled around him on top of the bedspread. That was how she slept, every single day of the week from hell that was purging the drugs out of Roy's system and coping with withdrawal.

Oliver had called a couple of time according to the answering machine. Devonte had come up to check on her, having seen the pages on the telefax from Dr Thompkins. He'd taken one look at the sick white boy and agreed that he could handle the shop the whole week, even making the deposits for her.

Di didn't even bother to double check the numbers, or worry about it. She trusted the young man, and knew he knew she'd help him if he just asked. 

By day eight, they were mostly past the worst of it, with Roy still weak but able to tolerate food and sit up for long periods of time. He hadn't tried to leave her since the third day, so she was beginning to think things could be normalizing.

"Think you can come sit with me downstairs today? Devonte needs to go to the clinic, so he should have the day off, and I probably need to do some arrangements. Devonte is learning those, but slowly."

"Yeah, Di. I can… or I can, ya know, start looking for some way to get out of your hair?" he said, which had her coming to drop beside him on the couch, arm going around him.

"Roy, I won't hold you here against your will," she told him. "But… I'd rather help you get properly on your feet. With school, or finding an apprenticeship or just giving you a chance to get your G.E.D. and look for work."

He ducked his head under the gentle words, and then looked at her. "Why are you doing this? Why didn't you just wash your hands of me?"

She played with his hair as she answered that. "One, no one should ever face a demon alone. Two, you're part of the community, and they have raised me. I need to give that back. Three, I've gotten kind of fond over your smart mouth over the last few years. Four, it was the right thing to do. Five… after hearing you tell me the bits you have, there's no way in hell I will ever walk away from you, sweetheart." She ended the last on a very soft note, before leaning over to kiss his temple. 

"I… you'll leave. You'll push me aside," he said, trying to make himself believe it, because then it wouldn't hurt so much when it happened.

"Not this side of living, Boy-o. You're stuck with me. You are officially a part of my forever family." She then ruffled his hair. "Come on. Devonte will think you're too scrawny if you don't put actual clothes on, and I need to get down there before he tries something silly like cancel his appointment. It took us too long to find a clinic that will help him."

"What's wrong with him?" Roy asked before he could censor himself. "Sorry, private and all."

Di shook her head. "He's not making bones about it. He's afraid he's got that disease Rock Hudson died from, because so many boys like him are getting it. We've been hunting for a clinic that focuses on it, so he can get tested, and then… try to help others."

Roy sobered suddenly, looking at her with sudden new fear. "Di… what… I mean… I—"

His stammering brought her quick mind to the same point, as a late night, craving-fueled confession came out.

"We'll see about getting you tested, for everything," she told him quietly. "And deal with the fallout as we have to."

That made Roy burrow into her arms, burying his face against her neck. With his luck, he'd kicked the smack just to come down with something that would kill him anyway.


	8. Expanding the Nest

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: after math of drug abuse, homelessness, riches to rags

Roy was helping clean the high spots of the shop, the ones Di had to use a stepladder for, when _he_ walked in. A quick glance at Di confirmed he hadn't known, and was moving to intercept before Ollie even noticed Roy in the corner.

"No, Di. It's fine," Roy said, putting the duster down. "But we're not doing this in here, Old Man," Roy added, coming over.

"Boy-o?"

"Needs to be me, first. You can decide later on how to go," Roy told her, and he basked in the look of pride from her. Two weeks past the last of the worst of it, and she was still supporting him, teaching him little things, letting him help her as he lined up a future of his own. He didn't understand, but he was slowly getting it through his head that he had a woman in his life who gave a damn and was doing good by him.

He walked out with Ollie, taking his former (and oh it was always going to be former, never to be fixed, as far as Roy cared) mentor and guardian around the corner. The service alleyway was just fine to handle this, as Roy was not going to shout.

He was going to be the kind of man Di could be proud of.

"You look good. Better than —"

Ollie's words faltered and Roy shook his head, running a hand through his hair. 

"I want to punch you. I really do. Might even land it, now that Di fixed my stance," Roy said. "But I won't, not right now. Maybe one day later, when I'm ready to be angry for real. Right now, though? I've got to get my life together.

"I've got to figure out who I'm going to be, so I can live up to whatever it is that woman in there sees that makes her keep trying. When, get this, she didn't even know my damn name when your boyfriend dumped me off on her," Roy said, voice intensifying, but never rising.

Ollie at least flushed in shame, flinching at the boyfriend comment.

"She's going to help me get my paper, and I'm looking at a few programs. You've taught me a lot, Ollie… but I'm never going back under your roof, and I sure as hell am never going to be your sidekick again. I fucked up, when I let my problems drive me down that road.

"But you didn't even try to figure out why, when you had just waltzed back from who the hell knew where, without ever having checked to see if things were okay."

"You said you'd be okay. You said you'd go to Bonnie's if you were in town, and you were supposed to be hanging out with the other Titans!" Ollie tried to defend himself.

"The Titans disbanded! I tried to tell you that and you just kept talking over me!" Roy snapped, still not yelling, but for all the lack of volume, it hit Ollie as hard as a punch might have. The paleness and then flush of shame did make Roy feel some satisfaction, and helped him rein it in a little. "They said we're getting too old for the stupid gimmicks and chasing the League's leftovers. That we needed to move on and grow up.

"Maybe they were right, Ollie. So this is me, growing up. I'm owning my mistakes, and I'm going to be a better man than I was growing into… and she's decided to help me do that."

"Alright." Ollie drew himself up and together, then reached out and gripped Roy's shoulder anyway. "I did screw up. Badly. I never should have done that, left you facing the demon alone. And… I know you're walking away; I get it. But I swear, Roy… I'll do my damnedest if you ever do need me."

Roy searched his face, then just shrugged. "I'm not going to push her to leave you, Old Man. But you better figure out how to really connect with her if you plan to convince her to stay in your life. She is one hell of a woman, and deserves better than you." With that said, Roy turned and left to go back into the shop.

Ollie did not follow him back in.

+++

It was a week after Roy had shipped off to a training center for the government agency that had contracted him. There had been a run-in with Green Arrow and Green Lantern just before he left, one where Roy finally did throw the punch that laid the old man out because of a comment that sat wrong with him.

_"Not going to tell you not to date him. He could do with someone to look after him. But you'll have to choose for yourself, Di."_

Now Di had her eyes on Green Arrow, after a long night, slipping down under an overpass to hunker down for the night. That… made less than no sense. She had trailed him when she knew the night was getting late and he wasn't turning to go back to the better side of town. Something was wrong, and despite her anger over Roy, she did still care.

She needed to understand.

That in mind, she made the leaps down to the ground from the low roof and walked boldly after him, catching up to him just as he had turned to settle with his back to a pillar of the overpass supports.

"Arrow."

He looked up at her with … surprise? Shame? Defensiveness?

"Canary," he said in a weary voice. "Come to gloat? To chastise me? What?"

A sliver of recent news, about Queen Industries ousting its C.E.O came back to her. She hadn't really thought past that Ollie might have to actually get his life in order… but apparently it had been more than that.

"Why don't you come home with me, Arrow, and use my shower, get a good meal, and talk with me," she said in a soft voice, wondering if Roy knew. Did Hal? Or was Ollie's pride keeping everyone at bay?

He stared up at her, sheer disbelief on his features, before he pushed to his feet, taking her at her offer's face value. "Maybe that would be good," he agreed.

She didn't move close, didn't take his hand, but she guided him back to her bike, and let him ride behind her to her place. She slid into the garage, secured the bike, waving Oliver to go on up after handing him a key. 

That he didn't argue, didn't banter, worried her. She wished she could ask Roy questions, but he was gone, carrying a brand new G.E.D. and with hopes for his future, still helping people, even if it was under a government agency. He even had a chosen to speak at rehabs, openly, as Speedy, as a former addict.

She wondered just how that was sitting with the other mentors, the other sidekicks… and shook her head. She needed to focus on Oliver. She needed to find out how being booted from his company had also put him on the streets. She didn't think that was how being wealthy worked.

She double-checked the shop and garage and service door, then made her own way up to hear the shower going. She let herself relax a little, just a tiny bit, at something so normal, and went to reheat the soup she had gotten earlier in the day from the Cantonese restaurant that had replaced her favorite Thai food spot.

The heat and spice of the soup helped thaw her out from the too chilly night, and that thought actually made her smile. She'd been out here on the west coast way too long, if high fifties were chilly. Some days she missed the snow and ice of her Gotham childhood, just for the contrast it was from eternal smog and sun.

She heard the shower cut off, wanted to tell him he could use a little more water, as she had been using a dehumidifier up here to get extra water for her shop, so she was running under the suggested use levels for her business and home combined, then let it go. She stirred the soup, idly noticing how many mushrooms and tofu cubes were in it. The cooks over there seemed to go out of their way to give her the best food portions.

It might have something to do with 'accidentally' foiling a robbery when she'd gone in just after they opened.

She heard Ollie begin down the hall to the kitchen and moved to pour the soup into two bowls. She'd meant to have it for dinner and breakfast, but she thought she had some health bars stashed down by the till that would do for breakfast.

She really needed to restock from having had a teenager living with her. 

"Hot and sour soup," she said, putting a bowl at his place, and a glass of water. "There's a loaf of bread in the box, if you want some to go with it."

"Not, that's fine, Pretty Bird," he said, sitting so that the bathrobe he had placed here in their first year stayed modestly closed. He ate the soup slowly, matching her sip for sip, and that reassured something in her soul. She took in the signs of weight dropped recently, of fatigue, and wanted to shake her head.

No wonder Roy had said someone needed to look after him. She ate slowly, encouraging his slow pace that way, until all of the soup was gone. Before she could move to wash them, he did, gathering them up and following all precautions on water use to get them clean. She watched him, trying to figure out what and how to do whatever was needed to both lance her lingering issues over Roy, and help Oliver.

When he turned and dried his hands on a towel, she stood up and reached for his left hand, to draw him into the living room, settling with him there on the couch. She didn't curl up against him, but she wasn't overly hostile in her posture either.

"Okay, Ollie. Let's talk," she said. "And, yes, I am listening. Roy told me I should let go of things, and make up my own mind about you. I'll probably never forgive you for his sake, but that is one issue. What I want to understand now is how you came to be down there, and what we need to do to fix things."

He swallowed hard, and looked away from her. She ached for the complicated emotions between them, before she chose to reach out and take his hand again.

"Oliver… I love you. I think you're a bone-headed idiot, and Roy could have been hurt far worse, but… I still love you so stupidly much. Talk to me."

"Lost the company… but you'd know that. You read the news, watch it too." Oliver took a deep breath, and turned back to face her. "I'd spotted some revenue leaks, was plugging them with my options and funds, while trying to unravel it. Deleon beat me at that game though, and pulled everything out from under me before I could prove what he'd done.

"Thing is, I never much kept funds out fro myself. I put it all into keeping me and Speedy geared, threw a lot of profit at charities. I was using tax loopholes to support the house… so when the board outed me, I basically lost it all. Deleon knew that, knew I wouldn't have the ability to rally a lawyer team and get my company back."

He gave a lopsided grin that was anything but happy, and shook his head. "Not many places want to hire on an ex-C.E.O. who inherited his title and made a pretty big reputation as a freeloading playboy and philanthropist."

She squeezed his hand gently. "You didn't talk to Hal about it, did you?"

"Around the edges. But he's got some family problems, and that dame of his has some issues, and I just… I just deserve it, Pretty Bird. What I did to Roy was inexcusable, and this is just desserts."

"Well, I honestly can't argue with that," Di told him, but she ran a thumb over his knuckles. "Question is, have you figured out how to make amends for the one, and move on from the second?"

He sighed, shifting and taking both his hands so he could put his face in them. "Not really, on either side. What assets I have are tangled up in the Arrow gear, and while I can still get into the cave, it's not a place for living. As to Roy?

"He made it clear I'm not welcome in his life, so no, I have no idea how to make amends."

Dinah scooted closer on the couch and ran a hand up into his still damp hair. "One step at a time, then." She closed her eyes, weighed all the options, and made a choice. "You could stay with me? Put your life back together, figure out how to handle ousting Deleon and getting access to something of your company?"

Ollie looked up at her and then shook his head. "I don't want to do that to you. You… you saved my boy. When I could easily have killed him by shoving him out like that. You gave him life, helped him fight it back. You already helped him put a life together for himself. I can't ask you to help the idiot that made that all necessary."

"You don't have to ask. I am offering it, Oliver," she told him. "Stay here. You can give me a hand with the shop, and maybe we'll tell the League we can be a bit more active now. I've got a great employee to cover when I need him to, and I won't be worrying about you so much."

She watched his eyes brim with tears, before he leaned over, kissing her very chastely when she did not dodge it.

"Now I know you're no human, but an angel sent to take care of us poor men," he said, shifting to lay his head on her lap, and she allowed that too, petting his hair gently.

"No angel, Oliver. Just… just a woman who tends to let her heart lead."

"I'll have to be careful to keep from abusing that," he whispered, his eyes closing under her gentle ministrations.

It was some time before she could bring herself to move, with him falling asleep like that, obviously feeling safe. When he just resettled on the couch without her thigh under him, she scooted a pillow under his head, and covered him with a blanket.

Turning the lights out, she went to her own bed, and hoped she had made the right choice.

+++

The phone rang, and Di swatted at Ollie, picking up the receiver. "The Bowery, Dinah speaking," she said with a smile still in her voice.

"Hey, Di," Roy said on the other end of the phone. "How's things?"

"Complicated as always? Oliver's here. Decided… maybe I can keep him from screwing up so much."

There was a long pause, before Roy sighed. "Well, if anyone can, it's you. Just wanted to call and tell you that I miss you but I think I am going to be able to hack this."

"Boy-o, I know you can and will. Can't wait for you to come home and see me again, though."

She didn't have to be standing where Roy was to know he had smiled, that quiet shy and disbelieving expression, to hear that.

"I'll come when I can, Di. I promise."

"I know you will. Now, I don't want you to run up a bill, so… I love you. Be safe."

"You too… and make sure the Old Man doesn't get himself into something stupid, alright?"

"I can do that. Bye, Boy-o," she said.

"See ya, Di."

She hung up the phone, and saw Ollie looking at her with a strange expression. "What?"

"I should have introduced you two properly ages ago. Maybe… maybe things would have been better."

"Or maybe worse. Maybes are not something we can trade in, Oliver, so let it go."


	9. Flying Forward

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Notes: Death of a minor, Crisis, Death of a hero, Sappy couple

_1990s_

Dinah laughed brightly, tucked under Oliver's arm as they walked down the boardwalk of the blink-and-miss-it tourist trap Great Frog had played this week. She didn't know if Roy ever spotted them, but ever since he started playing music to fill his time between contracts with the government, the pair had tried to catch up on his shows when they could. 

"Are they getting better or are our tastes getting worse?" Ollie asked, before nuzzling her hair, so happy with the lady he'd been dating for over five years, with a few ups and downs along the way. 

"Oliver, you're terrible!" she said with a smile, smacking his arm. "And I'm going to be charitable with 'better'." 

He walked her over to the carousel they had both admired from afar, and paid for a ride, sitting in one of the sleds with her to kiss, and just enjoy the quiet.

"How is he doing these days?" Ollie finally asked, head tipping in the direction of the bar. 

"Fair. He's contract to contract because the government doesn't like the fact he insists he be allowed to leave a kill shot to absolute last chance," Di told him. "He's been running into another agent… and he didn't say for what agency or country… that keeps making him stammer a bit when he talks about her."

"Oh ho, someone intriguing the boy a bit that's not Pointy Ear's brat?"

"Hush that, Ollie. Robin is a sweet young man, and Roy is no boy any longer," Dinah fussed at him. "There's a new team of kids, and Roy was a bit miffed not to be invited in, but he said he's over it. Says one of the new girls really hooked Robin hard, and they've kind of moved past being the way they were." She shook her head. "I'm not sure how much of _that_ I believe."

"Me either, Pretty Bird, given how they could be back then," Ollie said. He cuddled her a little closer, kissing at her ear… just before raised voice cut over the carousel music, and the pair had to look for the trouble. Looked like a gang scuffle, which had both moving to where they could help… because it was who they were.

+++

Ollie walked in from a delivery just as Dinah hung up the phone, looking troubled. 

"Pretty Bird?" He asked it softly, even as he went directly to her, wrapping his arms around her waist.

"That was… that was Roy. He just got back to New York from a mission, and … the kids? They lost someone. One of the new team, a girl named Terra. Roy said he's going to stay put there for a little while, see if he can lend a hand bringing in the ones behind it."

"Good on him, but damn. That's got to be hard on all of them," Ollie said, cuddling her closer. "Do we need to scrape up airfare so you can go help? Or maybe, with a dead hero, the League ought to be in on this?"

"I asked. Roy said 'no', that they will handle their own mess and issues." Dinah sighed at that. "Stubborn kids."

Ollie chuckled a bit. "You know, I can hear your mother's eye roll from here at you."

Dinah couldn't help but laugh. "Point in your favor," she agreed. "Why don't you go see if you can get in touch with Bruce, make certain he is aware?"

Piecing together that the League's Batman was the Mystery Man of her last year in Gotham hadn't taken much. And then Ollie had let slip who the rich boy in the mask was… but Dinah had just rolled with it, and let Ollie be the point of contact when they needed it.

"I think he's out of country? Training again, while supposedly checking on Wayne Enterprises' corporate partners abroad." Ollie let go of her so they could tackle the afternoon's work.

"Do you ever miss that part of things?" Dinah asked. "I know you complain about the tighter money, but… the actual workload that went with it?"

Ollie considered, as he started moving the delivery of supplies that had arrived while he was gone. "I don't think so, Pretty Bird. I'm thankful to Bruce for managing to hammer Deleon to the wall, and buy out the company. I like what he's converted it to, and having some residuals trickle in helps us both out.

"But, you've taught me how to make things work at a smaller level, and that's brought a whole new level of satisfaction to the effort."

She walked over and kissed him for those words, long and lingering on it, before she went to start making arrangements to replace the ones sold already.

+++

She was dreaming, dreaming of a time when she had been married, when she and her private eye husband had been partners, anticipating the start of their family.

And then there was a baby, a baby who cried and cried and cried, shaking the walls to their foundations, until Yz, the Thunderbolt, took the baby away and they all forgot about her. The baby grew up, trapped in a limbo dimension… until she lost her husband and handsome archer stole her away to his world. They would be happy, with her rejuvenated, now in the body that had been her daughter's —

— Dinah gasped awake in Oliver's arms and fumbled to get the bedside phone. Next to her, Ollie blinked awake, hearing the desperation in how Dinah punched the buttons.

"Mama?"

Ollie could almost make out the other woman being slightly hysterical on the other end. 

"Me too… no, I don't know what it means. I'm not uncle Wesley to figure such things out, Mama. I just… I know who I am… that's not right. But you had the exact same dream? I don't know." Dinah paused. "Yes, you're right, Mama. I'll head up and see if my teammates had strange dreams. I'll tell you what I find out." She paused, and Ollie couldn't hear anything, but then Dinah laughed. "Hush, Mama. He is very much mine! Love you." Dinah hung up the phone, half-smiling as she got out of bed to get dressed.

"Gonna clue me in, and am I going with or staying to open the shop?"

"Shouldn't take both of us, since you didn't get hit with it," Dinah told him. "Mama and I had the exact same dream that convinced me my whole life was a lie and made her sick on her stomach over it." She stepped out of the satin nightie so she could put on the Black Canary gear. "It felt… very real, and we're both concerned it might be a harbinger of some cosmic power.

"So, up to the satellite, see if anyone else is reporting bad dreams, and back down in time to handle the lunch rush," she told him. She then turned to see he was avidly watching her dress, and had to shake her head. "Most boyfriends are eager to see it come off," she said, with just the fishnets on so far. 

"Never going to be tired of seeing you show the world who you are. A dangerous, beautiful woman," he rumbled.

"Flatterer," she said, but she turned back to getting the bustier in place, wanting to run this errand while the dream was still fresh in her mind. If she was lucky, J'onn would be there, and her Martian friend could pull all the details up for her, and have them ready for dealing with others.

She was not certain why she thought others were affected, but just like she had known it had hit her mother, she had a gut feeling this was the beginning of something very big that would involve all of them, world-wide.

+++

Changeling was in danger, Wonder Woman was tangling with one of the Marvels, and Black Canary needed to figure out how to help, fast. Kole seemed to be handling her end of the task force well enough.

The skies were deepening in their red hue, and she could almost see the sphere of yet another Earth.

She didn't understand, none of them really did, and had to trust that their better, stronger friends figured it all out fast.

She felt almost naked without Green Arrow on her side, even if his greens did contrast her blue and black rather horribly…

…blue and black jumpsuit? What was this hell…

… Changeling yelled before his elephant form was thrown back by Captain Marvel, and Black Canary prepared to get back into the fight.

She got ready to sing as all of the Marvels were in the air, and hoped Wonder Woman forgave her.

+++

Green Arrow stood next to Black Canary on one side, with Speedy on her other, willingly in the same place as each other to support her this day in Central City for the most somber of reasons.

Many of the older League members were present, as were the original Titans. Near Canary, a somber Martian Manhunter stood with Aquaman, with Green Lantern actually standing beside Kid Flash, near the marker that had been erected.

The Spectre himself had reinforced to one and all that Barry Allen, their beloved Flash, had died a hero, saving them from a cosmic event that no one quite remembered now.

The remaining members of the first League let Kid Flash have the place of honor in laying the first wreath, but they were not far behind him. Black Canary lingered, fingers tracing the lightning bolt etched into the marker, before she let Green Arrow help her away from it.

"Go to your friend, Speedy," she said. "I'm… I'll be fine."

"You sure, Canary?" he asked softly.

"I have to be. And he needs you, Boy-o," she answered, as Ollie settled a hand at the small of her back. "Lantern says he's really not coping. Go help."

"Alright." Speedy cut Arrow a tight look, reminding him to be careful with the woman they both loved, albeit in different ways. Arrow just gave a slight nod, and the younger archer wandered over to where Kid Flash was being surrounded by Aqualad, Wondergirl, and Rob — Nightwing. Speedy had to get it through his head that was his name now, that he'd grown up and left kid things behind him.

Canary watched him walk away, then tucked back against Arrow's support. "Let's go on home. I… I don't think I can deal with everyone." She didn't want to have anyone, probably J'onn, ask about her mother. She didn't want to have to tell Speedy that her mother was dying, bit by bit, from cancer. And most of all, she didn't want to fall into a pit of 'remember whens' about Barry, about her Flash, that would leave her crying for days.

"If you're sure," Green Arrow said, understanding. Ever since the strangeness of the month prior, they'd all been unsettled, with bad news after bad news rolling in. It was no surprise to him that she could not bring herself to stay.

+++

Oliver set out the Italian he'd splurged on, pretty certain that the family running that little Italian shop were the best joke ever played against Marco Polo in history, given that they were very certainly Chinese, not Italian. 

Dinah came up from below, and frowned a little. "Ollie, I thought we agreed to cut down on the take-out until I can finalize the sale of mom's place?"

Even as she said it, she winced. She knew her mother was getting the best care, back in a city she knew much better, but the decision to help her move back to Gotham had hurt more than expected.

What if the cancer killed her before Dinah could get to her? She knew Batman had approved the use of the satellite transporters for that call for her, but… she was scared her mother would be alone when the end came.

"I know, Pretty Bird, but I've been thinking, and I wanted to set the mood. Plus Grandma Chang said she cooked too much for the lunch crowd."

Dinah sat down next to him, letting out a deep breath for this. "Okay. Thinking can be good. What are you thinking about?"

"I know things have been getting more ridiculously priced. We made it through the water shortages, but now they're talking about potential energy issues, and you said transport costs are driving up the prices on your supplies, mostly because of taxes." He poured wine into both of their glasses to accompany the meal. "What I'm saying, Di, is I think we should move. Go somewhere new, with a lower cost of living. Sell both shops, and start over in a new place.

"It would… distance us both from the ones getting used to us here. Infinity Inc has been a solid presence on this coast for long enough that I don't think we'd actually be leaving things at anyone's mercy, and it's more their ballgame anyway, ever since that meta-rogue popped up two months ago."

Dinah considered her 'cousins', as most of Infinity Inc had some kind of tie back to the old JSA or All-Star Squadron. 

"Is this something you're sure you can do?" Dinah asked him. "I mean, this has been your city forever."

Ollie covered her hand with one of his own. "With you at my side, Pretty Bird? I could go anywhere."

She laughed at him for that cheesy delivery, but leaned over and kissed his cheek. "Did you have a place in mind?"

"I hear Seattle's not so bad," he said, very casually. She nodded, considering that.

"Seattle's not, and it might give me better transport options for getting fresh — Oliver Jonas Queen! If you think I'm not seeing through you! Hmph." She shook her head, smiling at him. "Why didn't you just say you wanted to be closer to the ashram? You know I've been grateful for all the help you found there."

It had been a horrible time, after an accident in the middle of a fight caused Oliver's arrow to hit center mass, an actual tipped shaft, instead of a trick arrow. Green Arrow had been absolved, and the couple had anonymously donated a large part of their savings to the gang-member's family, but Ollie had been slow to forgive himself. 

Master Jansen had been a life-saver for them all, helping Ollie overcome his guilt and inability to fire the bow because of it.

He chuckled. "Some day, I'll remember to be up front on why I think the things I do, Pretty Bird." He took the time to kiss her. "I figure it might make selling your mother's shop easier, if the agent can offer both locations as a nascent franchise?"

"Maybe. I mean, Mama and I did a limited license to try and keep our headaches minimal," she said, heart still aching over her mother. "We'll see what they say."

"Alright. Now, let's not waste our wonderfully Chinese Italian meal." 

+++

The building stuck out to Dinah and Ollie both on their first pass through the district. It sat away from the adjacent properties, and had been modeled on a Victorian style house, but at a much reduced scale. That the ground floor had already been remodeled to a shop, with a large window to look in was a plus. The little faux turret was a nice touch, and Dinah kept it in mind as they searched other spots out. The tendency to have living and commercial quarters in one building had faded out earlier in Seattle than other places, so they really weren't finding much.

One building meant less chance of mass destruction if a rogue did trail them back. And the Victorian cottage was the least connected to other properties, while being close enough to a few churches and a hospital to be in the right area for a florist shop.

If Dinah was very careful in how she set the initial advertising and stocking, she was pretty certain she could get it in the black in under a year.

"What do you think?" she asked Ollie, after they had seen all of the available properties meeting their criteria.

"Is there even a question?" He put his notebook down, complete with a sketch of the cottage. "It's perfect for us to start over in."

She smiled brightly at him, then threw her arms around his neck, kissing him breathless in the next moment.

"I was thinking the very same thing!" she told him when she eased up on the kissing. "Plenty of space for us both on the upper floors, and it won't take that much work to make the ground floor a suitable flower shop!"

He smiled at her, and then nodded, happy they had both reached the same conclusion. It was one more piece of proof that this move was perfect, the right step in the beginning of a new, brighter life for them both.


	10. Broken Wings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: Relationship issues, Graphic Violence, Violence aftermath, Traumatic Reactions, Death of a Parent

Both of them had put in time and effort on their new home and business. Calling it the 'Sherwood Florist' had actually been Dinah's idea, and it had tickled Ollie so much. He knew money was tighter than either of them had anticipated, and was looking for a way to help out beyond working with her, but for right not? Things were perfect.

Of course that meant things had to go sideways, and they started with a girl named Rita. The instant she smashed through the window, Dinah was right back to the mindset of Black Canary, needing to find the source and eliminate it, so the kids around her new place would be safe.

Ollie didn't really disagree, but knew the crusade against drugs was very much a personal thing for her, given her history with his sidekick. It wasn't that he hated it less; it was that she had been too close to the effects of it to not make it her personal mission.

Having been so close to opening the shop, but now having to wait for the window to be replaced, Dinah had the time to start the investigation into the supply line that had led Rita down her path. She didn't know the local power structure yet, but figured it wouldn't be that hard to pick up on it as she went.

She wasn't expecting Ollie to throw her off her game, though.

"Marry me, Dinah," Ollie said, as they were lounging in bed after sex, nothing uncommon for them.

Was this part of a mid-life crisis? A lingering effect from the accident in Star City? How could he even push that issue, of all things? Granted, he had never really picked up on the fact she knew when he went away with Hal that they did things other than heroing and fishing. But still, why would he hit her with a proposal out of the blue?

"And screw up a good relationship?"

Her flippant answer was not what he was looking for, but Dinah knew this was not the right time, that neither of them were ready for it. Yes, he was forty, and she was twenty-seven, but marriage…

…marriage scared her. Marriage meant more than just sharing lives, like they already did. Marriage was something final, and led to children. Neither of them could, or would, stop running the streets. There was no parent to stay home, like with her own. 

The look of betrayal in his eyes, as they discussed making a family hit her in the gut. And then he said it.

"I want to have kids, Dinah. I want us to be a family."

Every single fear she had over how dark the world was, all the ways she understood why her mother had fought her choice to be a hero, all the struggles of the other JSA kids came to mind.

"Oliver, I don't want to have children," she told him, admitting the truth of it in this moment. 

"C'mon, you love kids."

"Yes."

"Well?"

"That's why I'm not going to have any. What we do is too important, too needed. It's not about just us. It's about all the lives we touch. But it's dangerous. We both know that either of us could be killed, any night that we go out there. Or, worse, both of us could be.

"I'd love to make children with you, Oliver. But I won't make orphans."

He let it go, and Dinah hoped he understood. He might be forty, they'd already been together for years, but marriage? Children? Those were not subjects she was willing to entertain, not unless the heroes started making the world a lot brighter than it was currently.

+++

One aspect of a costumed hero's life that was often overlooked in the media surrounding them was just how they came to have costumes.

With Ollie feeling so nostalgic and wrapped up in his life lately, Dinah had known just what she wanted to make for him, even before the uneasy talk of family. His birthday was close, but so was the lead she had picked up.

Watching him try on the Hunter's garb for the first time, though, made her smile. The costume had been a pain to piece together from Ollie's beloved painting, to adapt for the full range of motion a fighter needed, but she was pretty pleased with the end results. She still wasn't certain about his choice to go back to solely using tipped arrows, feeling it was an extreme move coming out of his need to prove he would never do as had happened in Star City again, but she had to accept it.

Neither of them policed each other on their methodology. That was part of their partnership, to trust each other's choices.

"Looks good, handsome," she said, smiling at him. The smile he gave her in turn was full enough to make her think that maybe, just maybe, the idea of making a family had been a momentary lapse of who they were, a wistfulness for a life neither of them were made for.

"You always do good work, Dinah," he said, shrugging the shoulders. "All the room I need, and it will be better in this weather we've moved to."

"Tried to water proof it as best I could. The quiver shouldn't hold water either, as the bottom is porous for that reason," she said. "Still working out just what I want to update mine to, but yours was easy to decide on."

"Just a pill to actually put together?" he teased her. 

"Something like that." She came and kissed his cheek. "The window won't be fully installed until next week, and I stopped delivery for now on flowers. I want to know I can open the next day rather than risk losing stock to wilt and delays."

"You're going back out tonight, then?"

"Actually, in about half an hour," she told him. "You want to find a killer, either the slasher or the Robin Hood, and I want to understand how drugs are flowing. So we'll both be working, maybe right up to your birthday.

"It's why I wanted to give you your present already."

He tucked her in tight along his chest, dipping to kiss her gently. "Alright. And you're right. I need to do something to help. Can't stand by while those girls keep getting carved up, and I don't need someone thinking to pin arrow-related crimes on me.

"Doesn't look like Merlyn's work, so I'm curious who the new archer on the block is," he said. "While wanting to make certain they go behind bars. Hunting people like that is just… horrible."

"I know, Oliver." She patted his cheek, then went up to their bedroom to find clothes that would work for investigating the lead she had tonight. Maybe with a case, or two it looked like, of his own, Ollie would settle down for a while.

+++

If Ollie blew her cover, she was going to absolutely throttle him. Dinah pushed the thought away as she glared one last time at her partner before walking into the bar with Iggy Brown. She played pretty simpering young thing well, even if she was closer to thirty than twenty, and he was eating it up.

All she needed was an in to identify his connection, and she would get down to the business of shutting down this particular drug ring.

When they stepped out of the bar, after some pretty insipid conversations that might have been about the shipments of drugs, but nothing concrete enough for her to use, she let him think she was utterly beguiled by him and his lines about putting her in the best furs and the satin sheets at his place.

Later, she might blame the lack of familiarity with the city. She would certainly blame her inability to react quick enough as the knife sprouted through her lead's chest, a good two inches visible. She was moving at the first jerk, the entrapment by several men all too clear to her now… and then several hundred volts of electricity poured through her nervous system under a taser.

+++

One eye was swollen shut. She could only barely see. Her throat had long ago become too bruised to even think of using a Cry. That was when they'd taken the gag out, so they could hear her scream. She couldn't remember her last full breath, slowly asphyxiating under her own weight, held up solely by her wrists. She could almost be glad her nose had broken under a blow at some point, and the swelling was keeping her from smelling the blood and other things mixing beneath where she hung.

The sadist had the knife again, and he was coming closer. Maybe this time, she wouldn't have the breath to scream. Maybe this time, he'd push too hard.

The knife pressed against skin and began to peel it away, and she screamed again.

+++

The next time she came conscious, there were others in the room. The sadist was talking to one of them, and she could not make her brain understand the words. 

How much more before she lost the will to live?

Maybe this time would see it end.

She was sorry her death would be on Ollie's birthday, but there was only so much any human could endure. 

The sadist closed the distance, and then… he jerked, just a little, face turning to complete surprise. The one eye that could still track saw the green-tipped arrow, heard the crash of Oliver following the shot into the room.

He was there, he was getting her free, but she was so weak. Would she be able to hold on long enough for him?

They were outside, her body cradled to his chest, only moments later, or maybe an eternity had passed. She was mostly past the pain, nothing but cold in her limbs, her mind detached and fading away. Only his birthday hovered there and she was sorry for missing it.

Maybe she even managed to tell him that, as she dimly heard him crying her name out with all he was.

Maybe after all of that pain, dying would be like going to sleep now.

+++

"Wake up, Little Miss!"

Di rolled over from where she had fallen asleep in front of Johnny Carson to see her daddy coming in, and smiled brightly, clambering to her feet to run to him. He caught her up and held her close, petting her long black pigtails, and clinging to her.

"You know you're not supposed to be here," he said, and she frowned, shaking her head. Where else should she be, than right there where her daddy could keep her safe forever and ever?

"There's people all over that need you to be with them, Little Miss. Things still to come that need your touch."

Why was Daddy talking like that? Why did Daddy act like she was important? That was Mama and him. He kept the streets safe by day, and she protected them at night.

"You have to wake up."

She wanted to tell him she was awake, right there in his arms, but her voice was locked up tight. He looked at her sadly, then put his cheek against hers. 

"I miss you, Little Miss, but your turn down there isn't done. Go do what you do best, and make the world a better place."

She didn't want to let go, didn't want to leave the quiet happiness of the living room, of his safe arms —

— and it all melted away around her, leaving her in a starry void, one she knew was all of creation in its entire expanse.

She was not alone, as the green-cloaked, white faced Spectre hung between her and the void that beckoned. 

"Uncle Jim?" she asked, her voice hoarse and broken. He reached out and touched her throat, and the pain there eased… but it felt hollow now.

"You have died twice since your ordeal began," he told her. "This is not meant to be the end, but it might be, Little Canary. You have to choose now, for the next time your heart stops, it may not begin again without more than science can give to it."

Dinah looked at the void, then behind her, and found the Earth far beneath her bare feet, and she realized she was in no more than a hospital gown.

All of the pain of what she had experienced blazed through her, along with the absolute helplessness that had gripped her from the first cut. 

She sobbed, but the Spectre made no move toward her, already stretching his powers to the limit, in order to intervene. Dinah dropped to her knees in the nothingness, and clawed at the invisible lines on her arms, on her wrists, as the tempo of her heart weakened in her physical existence.

"It hurts!"

To the side, a pale girl, marked by a wadjet and wearing an ankh around her neck waited peacefully, keeping her own counsel about this.

"You've known all your life that it had cost, that pain was inevitable." The Spectre's voice was neutral, but his host was all but shouting for Dinah to get up, to make the choice needed. "You, who fought time and again just to have the chance to stand for others.

"You could stop fighting, take the easy slide into oblivion, and be done with it all."

Her face came up with defiance in her eyes, her teeth bared in a grimace as she pushed past the pain. "I. Don't. Give. Up!"

To the side, the pale girl tipped her hat, and vanished away.

The Spectre smiled — and the void became nothing but the sound of machines around her, the practiced motions of medical professionals.

"She's stable, Doctor," a nurse said, voice slightly mystified, as if that was completely unexpected. This time, as Dinah faded, it was with an awareness that she would wake up again.

+++

"Do you want me to try and call Roy?" Ollie asked, as Dinah got herself lowered into the bathtub, with Ollie facing away.

"No, Oliver," she said quietly. 

"Just thought… all you two went through with him, maybe you'd be better with his help?"

The thought was a good one, except it left out that Dinah had had to be the strong one, and Roy was still young enough to need that illusion of strength to fall back on. 

"Just give me a few days, Ollie. I'm going to beat this." There wasn't enough water in the tub to hide the marks. Technically, she should be taking a shower or a sponge bath, but she needed to feel truly clean. A couple inches of water to sit in, not deep enough to submerge all of the stitched cuts with their puckering skin, and a soft cloth were going to have to do.

It was bad enough Ollie had seen the wounds still bleeding. She could not cope with him seeing her like this, a mess of lines and scar tissue in the making. She could not look at it without her hand shaking, like now, as she remembered being helpless to stop it, remembered wanting to die.

Yet… she hadn't.

She could move past this.

She would rise again, the Black Canary. It was just going to take a little time.

+++

Annie had tried.

Dinah had listened to her therapist, had tried every single exercise, but the calm and confidence vanished if Oliver made any move to take it to an intimate level. She couldn't sit too close to him, wasn't sharing the bed, hated for him to walk into the bathroom when she was in there. 

She'd never been particularly vain, and she didn't think it was just letting him see the road-map of cuts, now healed over into a network of fine lines.

It was knowing that he had seen her then, when she had been helpless, knowing that image would never leave his mind. It was the fact she had yet to set foot back on the streets after dark, or without him at her side. It was the idea that she, Dinah Laurel Lance, daughter of a streetwise cop and an actual, true hero of the JSA… was afraid that she would not ever be able to again. Until she got that under control, until she knew her body and her skills were truly her own again, she could not give it to another.

And so she walked away, again, from Oliver's gentle slow kiss, curling up in the window seat of their room, until the tears had ran their course. She didn't even know when he left, to go take his frustrations out on the streets and their thugs.

+++

Christmas was supposed to be about giving, but not the way these jerks were doing it. Before they could get back to her, or even notice past the hysteria of the first few victims, she let the window of the bus down and bounced out, onto the cab beside it. She turned that momentum into helping her leap up on top of the bus, running light but sure-footed down its length.

She got the first two thugs as the came down the steps, and then she was caught up in the fight, blood singing as her fists and feet worked through the would-be thieves. She took far more hits than she should have, a small part of her brain said, but it felt good to put them all down… and the citizens joined in to hold them down, confiscating weapons, when the fight was done.

She didn't care so much for their cheers, but the fact she had just acted made her feel like maybe, just maybe, she was back to being who she was meant to be.

That euphoria carried her all the way home, all the way inside and up to Oliver's floor. A smile lit her features, watching him play with a toaster and his arrows.

And then he was looking at her, taking in the already bruised side of her face, panic and worry in his eyes.

That snaked a tendril of fear up, that he might not ever be able to see her as his partner again, a capable fighter that had run the streets of Star City with or without him, fixing the problems.

She shoved it down, her re-found confidence holding her steady. "We're going to be better," she promised him, holding a hand out to draw him close, making that last step. He met her kiss with his own, going as slow as she could possibly need, and not protesting a bit when she took charge all the way to the bed, and then some.

+++

"Junior," the voice on the other end said. "You need to come home. It's time, or nearly."

Dinah's hand clenched on the phone receiver. "I'll be there soon, Aunt Molly. Thank you."

She turned to get Black Canary's outfit on, still none too pleased with the pants and jacket, but not ready to bare her scars to the world. The cuff bracelets she'd had made especially to hide the wrist ones were the last things to go on, and by the time she looked up, Ollie was there, also already dressed for the JLA.

"Saw you go change after the call. Thought maybe you'd want me there?" he offered, and she nodded, coming to tuck into his side.

"Molly says it's not long now."

"Let's go use the super-secret transporters then," he said, forcing cheer even as he ached for her. His loss of his parents was more than long enough past to be nothing more than a memory and dim regret. Dinah? Called her mom every week, even when money was tight, until the assisted living folks said the calls weren't helping. And then it was a call to Molly Scott, once called the Harlequin, to see if there was anything else that could be done, every other week.

Ollie picked up a duffel bag that had a casual outfit for both of them, and led the way down to the car so they could get to the transporters. He didn't blame Di for being quiet, and just hoped this was the only trip they had to make. Dinah Senior had already outlived the initial projections, but cancer was cancer.

+++

Dinah held her mother's hand in hers as the machines beeped and warned of failing oxygen rates, of fading blood pressure, of a slowing heart rate. The nurse to the side was there to note time of death, and Oliver was waiting at the window.

"Little miss?" 

"I'm here, Mama," Dinah answered, moving to straighten the blanket for her.

"Keep them safe, baby."

The words were a whispery exhale, and Dinah's eyes filled with tears.

"Always, Mama. You go kiss Daddy for me."

"Yes, baby."

The room got quieter, somehow, despite the beeping that was becoming more insistent about a fading life. Ollie looked over when the tones went flat, and moved swiftly to stand behind his life-partner as she bowed her head over the shell of a once vibrant woman.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *some dialogue in this part is DIRECTLY lifted from Mike Grell's writing, because the way he handled the discussion of children and marriage between the pair resonated with me for years


	11. Lost Nests

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: Canon-Typical violence, infertility due to trauma, dysfunctional relationships, aftermath of a non-con encounter, serial rapist, extreme vigilantism

Ollie got in from deliveries, and found that Dinah had left a note, saying the League had called. She'd been helping them again, off and on, but since her mother's death, the on had been a little heavier. 

Ollie was pretty certain it had as much to do with the deathbed promise as with all the complications the C.I.A. and Shado had made in their lives. Well, he had a lead to follow up on, something pretty solid, to try and put a halt to the deepening gang war. He left a note of his own, and geared up for the night, heading out to make the world better, his way.

+++

They had watched the news, and Dinah had watched as Oliver lost his temper, snatching up his gear. She had tried to let it go, but the longer she laid in bed, the more she knew something was truly, horribly wrong. She managed to drift off… only to come up in the next hour intent on what she knew in her heart.

Ollie was in danger, and needed her, somewhere!

+++

The warehouse would be a fortress from everything Dinah had been able to learn. She had seen the fear in the neighborhood as she moved this way, careful to not make too many waves. She didn't dare let anyone glimpse her before she was ready to move.

"Forgive me, Boy-o," she whispered on the wind to the man her lover's sidekick had become. He was so far away from her now, embroiled in problems of his own, but she'd promised. She had promised to be there for him no matter what.

The chances of making it out of the armed camp sitting in that warehouse were not so favorable, though. She watched the outer guards long enough to see the pattern, to figure out where they stretched too thin, and then she was on the move.

The first sentry gave her a weapon. While she had never been one for using them in her night to night work, she had not neglected learning them. One after another fell to her, injured or worse, supplying her with weaponry to keep going. Once word penetrated the ranks that they were under attack it got harder, but now she was inside, where her small frame and Gotham-trained sneaking abilities worked in her favor.

Then she actually saw Ollie, and terror gripped her heart firmly.

Was this what her lover had felt that day at the wharf? She felt no pity for him, only fear that she would not be able to save him. Getting him down took effort, and then she had to quiet him, even as she tucked one of the stolen Berettas away. He had suffered enough, and she certainly had paid her share two years earlier.

If they could not make it out of the warehouse, she would make certain that nothing hurt either of them ever again.

+++

Ollie woke from where he had fallen asleep on the couch to hear Dinah talking in very low tones to someone. He tried to focus, tried to hear, but his body was so hurt, and his head was still full of wool, it felt like, that he drifted off again. 

When he woke the next time, Dinah was sitting on the couch too, with his head in her lap. He looked up at her, saw a few bruises under the makeup of the day, and took a deep breath.

"You were on the phone," he said, his mouth full of sawdust. She shifted and got a cup of water with straw in place for him to sip.

"Yes. Roy called. He's had a bit of a shake-up in his life, one that he only really felt comfortable telling me about just now," she told her lover. She bit her lip, having been doing a lot of thinking, and then Roy's call had just added to the weight of what she was feeling.

"Anything he needs you for?" Oliver asked, steeling himself for her leaving, and almost wishing she would, so he could… maybe forget what she had done.

Flickers of gunfire, an explosion, her promise not to let them be chained again… all of it was exactly as he had done, or would have, at the warehouse two years ago. He knew that.

Why did it sting worse for it to have been her in his place? How could he face her, knowing his carelessness had made her see him so helpless, that she had killed, repeatedly, to get him free of that place.

"No. A teammate's mother is apparently stepping in to help with the situation," she said. "You really ought to get more sleep, Oliver. You lost a lot of blood back there."

He considered saying 'not as much as you', given that he was already back at the house, when she'd been in the hospital so long. But his eyes were already closing and he didn't want to win that one anyway. 

He'd find out what was up with Roy later, after he'd buried this whole mess down in the quagmire that held the kill he'd made for Dinah.

+++

Dinah had looked at the blood-stained costume far too long. She had made up her mind, and now just needed to see if she could reach Ollie through his apathy and pain. He wouldn't open up, had barely agreed to go see Anne, but maybe… maybe the choice she would offer would help him refocus and begin to heal.

She sat down with him in his room, watching him panic inside his own head, knowing the struggle from both sides now. She waited for him to actually focus on her, and then reached, offering him her hands, wrists up and showing the marks she always tried to hide.

"I almost lost you, Oliver. And maybe this is very selfish, but I don't think I want to face a future that there isn't a piece of us both, to let us hang on to, should something really go wrong," she said. "I want to try for a child. If you want to, I can stop the birth control now, and maybe next month, or the month after, I'd be able to?"

He blinked once, then his eyes were brimming, before he moved, throwing himself into her space, holding her so tight, body shuddering. His kisses on her hair were full of pain, full of desperation, but Dinah felt like maybe they were a mark of a turning point.

"Yes, Pretty Bird. Yes."

+++

"I'm sorry, Ms Lance," the doctor said. "There's too much scarring. Your body will reject any of the current fertility treatment options. Basically, your uterus will never be anything but a hostile environment." She looked at Dinah sympathetically. "There are women willing to host children… using your eggs, and the sperm of the father you chose?"

"Thank you. I… this is a lot to deal with, ma'am. And… I really need to talk to my partner." 

Dinah felt cold, as cold as when all of her blood had been draining from her body in that warehouse. How could it be like this? How was she going to tell Oliver? Hell, he'd barely been able to believe the news about Roy, and the little girl Roy now had, but he'd been so happy about it, and their choice to make one of their own.

She was going to have to tell him. Even if they did look at other options, like maybe adopting, it would not soothe this pain, after they had both chosen this path.

She hoped he came back from whatever mission had taken him away soon. She gathered her purse and made her way out of the clinic, walking the short distance back to her neighborhood in a fugue, incapable of even beginning to truly accept the fact of her existence that she would never have a child of her own.

+++

The minute Dinah knew Ollie was on the run, she knew she needed help. Roy was out of the question, but there was another player in the mix, one that she was betting would be as invested in saving Oliver as she would be herself.

She hated making the phone call, though, hated reaching out to the woman that shared the love of the bow, that could make Ollie drop everything and just go.

It had to be done, had to happen if she was going to save Oliver from the mess he had mired himself in from his inability to cope with what Dinah had done for him. In so many ways, him being on the run fell back on her choices, so what was one more?

She dialed the number, waiting until the soft voice answered in English. Dinah gave her more credit for having done so, for noting that it was an international call.

"He needs you. Will you come?" Dinah asked, without identifying herself.

"I will."

+++

The instant Dinah saw the toddler, she knew. Less than a week after learning what she could not give Oliver, and she was looking his dream in the face, side by side with a woman that lived, breathed, and dreamed the art of the bow in a way Dinah could never share. 

"And while I hunt him? My son?" the woman with her bow and tattoos and hold on Oliver's soul asked. 

There were more meanings in those words, hitting against all of the talking that had come before. Dinah looked at the child, the one she claimed, that Ollie had made with her so unknowingly. 

"Your son will always be safe with me, Shado."

The bow-mistress nodded, accepting that, knowing that barring her own death, the secret of the boy's heritage would be as safe as his life.

+++

Dinah had been gunning hard for Hauke since news of his release hit. She was not going to let him hurt another child or elderly person, anyone, on her watch.

"Let's see how you do with someone who can fight back, you bastard," she said, advancing on him now that she had him in sights, and the van was coming to a stop. Even with the tool he'd picked up to club at her, she was on top, dominating the fight from beginning to end.

The very bonds she knew he'd meant to use on the girl he'd nearly snatched were used to secure him inside his demented van, dangling on the edge of the pier. She straightened herself out, made sure the fishnets were solidly aligned, feeling the van rock now that she wasn't actively kicking the predator.

She stood still a moment, letting the balance of the vehicle settle, feeling by the incline it was forward of its front axle off the end. She looked at Hauke, her eyes going narrow. Attempt kidnapping, when the kid wouldn't even remember enough details and no two witnesses would agree meant he was going to go free, and be a threat to society, yet again.

She wanted him off the streets.

She spared one more look at him, then lightly walked up the slight incline, pushing open one of the rear doors, feeling the van rock in response. Oliver and the detective were right outside as she pushed off on her right foot, harder than maybe she needed to, to come out of the van.

The pier vibrated through the soles of her boots, and she heard an ominous creak of wood and then metal. She took a few more steps away from the van before turning, so that she could see as it slid into the water with its bound captive still inside.

Too bad the Seattle Police Department didn't have a water-rescue crew right at hand when it happened.

+++

Dinah looked up as Roy came in, his beautiful little girl at his side, and she almost told him he should go. She didn't know where Oliver had left for, other than out of the home they had shared for years now.

A lot of the words she had said in breaking up with him had been painful, to say, and to hear. 

She looked at Roy, though, and then down at Lian, who she only barely knew from a couple of conversations on the phone and one brief meeting during a rare JLA run that had needed C.B.I. assistance. Those words might have come out as resenting their place in Ollie's life, but honestly? She knew the fault was in herself. 

She had spent more time waiting on Oliver to actually be a part of her life than she had spent living it. And this young man, with his daughter, should be a part of that life in bigger ways.

"Hey, Di," he said, braced for whatever reply he got. She came around from the counter, walked to him, and then dropped down in front of Lian.

"Hey, Roy. Hi, Lian. I wish I had gotten to see more of you before now, and not when things were so scary," she said softly. "So, can you and your daddy stay a while with me?"

Roy crouched down too, arm around the center of his reason for existing. "Don't have to go back right away," he said. "You want to stay, _etai yazi_?"

Lian nodded, somewhat solemnly, and then reached out, small fingers touching Dinah's eye. "Crying?"

Di hadn't realized she was tearing up as she made her offer, as she realized she needed to be closer to these two now that she had chosen to stop waiting on Oliver. "I am, Lian. Because a lot of things are sad, but some are happy, and I have to cry to let it all out," she explained. "Can I get a hug, to help the good things be better?"

Lian unreservedly wrapped both arms around Dinah's neck, and hugged, as Dinah returned it oh so gently. When she sat back from the hug, she wiped her eyes and then looked at Roy, raising an eyebrow.

"Caught up with me, suggested we swing by," Roy confirmed to the unspoken question. "I know you have reasons, and I'm not asking… but I'm here for you, no matter what."

That got him hugged hard, and she did cry a little then, because it was more than she felt like she deserved in the moment.


	12. From Zero to Final

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: horrific destruction, major character deaths, dysfunctional relationships

Almost hand in hand with her breaking it off with Oliver, the Sherwood Florist had been all but destroyed by an explosion. Rebuilding wasn't an option, and creditors smelled blood in the water.

The Drug Enforcement Agency was willing step in and help out, if she would work their undercover rings. She had a range that went from Echo Park to Portland, sliding in and out of local cultures, making out the power structures, and identifying who the little men were against the big fish.

It suited her, they kept the bills paid, and she got over her qualms about being on the government payroll pretty quickly, given Roy's profession between helping the Titans out.

She, like many heroes, answered the call to try and stop the rampage of what they wound up calling Doomsday. She mourned when Superman fell, and shuddered as America fell prey to the manipulations of those who stood up to claim the mantle for themselves. 

Because of that, she was on the disaster response team for Coast City, unsurprised when she saw Oliver giving his all to it as well. Hal Jordan's absence sparked her attention for a minute, but then she was too busy to do more than assume he was in pursuit of whomever had destroyed his city so completely.

+++

Reality had turned inside out, and when things settled, Dinah knew life had changed, but not in ways she could actually put a finger on. She was still drowning in debt, still fighting to stay at a level that she could manage her dual life with. 

And then Oliver Queen was on her doorstep, without his bow, dressed in ragged jeans and a flannel shirt that had seen better days. The scruff around his normally well-groomed beard and mustache spoke volumes, as she appraised him.

"Pretty … Dinah?" he asked, voice rough and showing signs of disuse as he shifted from the familiar pet name to her proper one. "Can I… please…" He struggled to manage to ask for help, and all the love she had never lost for him came to the forefront.

"Come in, Oliver."

He did, step after faltering step, before he just froze, barely inside, as if his whole body was rebelling against the idea of doing this.

She reached out then, left hand reaching for his right one, and right hand going up to his shoulder, gripping it firmly to pull him toward her. He shook once, twice, and then plastered to her, letting her arms fold around him and hold on. She managed to push the door closed, before they were sinking to the floor, his body in her hold, forehead on her shoulder, as he wept in silence but no sign of stopping.

"Oh, Ollie," she soothed, letting him weep, pressing her lips to his hair, just giving him the physical support until he could talk to her. Her legs were cramped, her back twinging, and her arms ached from squeezing him tight by the time his shoulders heaved in a final sob, and quiet came over them both. It was a quiet that lingered, until she finally had to stretch her legs out and used that as a reason to coax him to his feet. He came, pliant and obedient now that he had cried himself out. 

She settled on the couch, and let him stretch out fully on it, his head on her thighs, looking at her stomach but not really seeing her. 

"Did… things change for you?"

"Yes," Dinah said. "Can't place it, but lots of little things being not quite right in my memory?"

Ollie closed his eyes, even as he nodded. "Big cosmic thing. Some remember, some don't, most heroes and rogues seem to be like you and know things are different but not how."

"And you… know? Because you were involved?" she probed, getting a full body shudder and then a nod. Dinah kept petting his hair, waiting for him to speak from there.

"It was Hal, Pretty Bird. He… Coast… it broke him. He… I guess he tried to bring it all back, and he couldn't so he went after the little blue guys, to take the power he needed. Only, from what the kid said, he was anticipated, and the Corps mobilized.

"Dinah… he killed them. Either directly, or by stealing the full power of the Batteries, no matter where the Lanterns were," Ollie said, in a tone of a man trying to make himself remember he was talking about a monster. Her flinch was a violent one, before he continued. "He decided remaking Coast City wasn't enough. That he could remake the universe, fix it all, and decide to exclude anything he didn't want to exist.

"Each ripple seemed to open a world that was just a little, or a lot, different than what we knew as reality. I wound up working hand in hand with a Batgirl that I know I've never met, and we had the kid, that new Lantern, among others, helping to get to where Hal was. 

"He wasn't going to stop, Dinah. He couldn't, too lost in whatever had taken him, made him into Parallax," Ollie whispered. "And he just… unmade the Batgirl, right in front of me. I… I…" He pushed his face against her stomach as chills came over Dinah, knowing what the unsaid words were.

She moved, and Ollie tensed, but then she was on the outer edge of her couch, wrapping around his back, full body length against him.

"I… that is terrible," she whispered. "And… Hal died in Coast City, from what you said. What that was was only a shell, inhabited by every negative emotion any of us have ever held. You did what was needed, and our Hal would only be thankful to you for it," she told him.

Ollie nodded, pushing his body into her hold, letting her protect him this once. Everything was aching, from his heart to his head, but maybe he could push past it, maybe he'd find something worth living for again.

Maybe he'd forget the sound of the arrow breaking through the costume, sundering flesh and bone, the spray of energy and blood alike.

He didn't think so, but with Dinah wrapped around him like this, it was a good hope.

He grew quiet and she let him, staying very close. When the house had dimmed with the growing night outside, she did stand, and he sat up, allowing her to reach for his hand and guide him to his feet.

"Stay?" she invited, voice and eyes soft as she looked at him with love and sympathy for the recent days.

Her simple invitation made some of the pain fade, and he nodded, letting her guide him back to her room, willing himself to go with the flow. She coaxed him out of his clothes, shedding her own, and guided him into her shower. It helped, some, to feel the care she gave him in getting his hair and beard clean, letting him wash up. The familiar intimacy struck hard against the shattered places within him, and he didn't protest at being settled on the stool, so she could barber his hair and mustache and beard. It all felt right, good even, and blotted out the horrors he'd seen, that he'd done.

Food, a night curled in her arms that was nothing about sex and everything about being safe in the presence of someone he loved followed.

However, when Dinah woke the next morning, she woke alone, and knew, without a doubt, that Ollie was as dead inside as Hal was in body.

+++

Connor Hawke looked at the modest house, then down at the address, verifying he was in the right place, even if Eddie's handwriting was atrocious.

_"I could do it, kid. She knows me."_

_"My impression, Eddie, is that she prefers punching your lights out to seeing you. No. This is my duty to perform. You admitted that she is the one he always loved. I will go."_

Maybe, he should have let Eddie come anyway. Or tried to speak to the very angry redhead his father had introduced him to a few days before.

This woman's name had been on his father's lips more than any other human being's. Her picture had been in the wallet left in the bag placed in his care before… before…

He took a deep breath, and took the next step, another, all the way up the walkway from where the cab had dropped him to a broad tree. The house was dim, and there was no car. Master Jansen had told him, when he had called the ashram for advice, to be forward and direct with the woman, that she was of a different cut than Oliver Queen, yet understood the truth of things.

Not quite an hour later, a little red sports car pulled up and a woman in fishnets, boots, leather bustier and jacket climbed out. The face was hard, but it matched the picture his father had carried. This then was Dinah Lance, often called Black Canary.

"If you're a collector, the check's in the mail," she said as Connor stepped forward.

"Actually, Ms Lance, I came to speak to you about Oliver Queen," he managed to make himself say. He saw the fluid change from hard to afraid to resolved, before she led him up to the house and inside. He couldn't even get it out before she looked at him and said it herself.

"He's dead?"

His face must have given all the confirmation she needed, because she walked away, standing by the mantle, where a picture of her, another man, and his father rested. She placed her hand on it, and stood there, her shoulders betraying the emotion of a woman whose heart was breaking.

Connor wished he knew how to help her, to make it less painful, but she was a stranger, more than his father had been, and Eddie said she was a very hard woman on top of it. Slowly, though, she pulled herself together, and raised the picture up, looking at it a long moment, before turning to look at him.

He almost squirmed under the intensity of that gaze, as she just set the picture down and tipped her chin up.

"Did he know? About you?"

With his darker skin, Connor was not accustomed to being immediately identified that way, but it was clear to him that she had made the guess.

Then again, she had been his father's partner, and more, for over a decade.

"At the end, yes. Before, I was merely a student from the ashram that wished to be like him."

She took in a deep breath, keeping words behind her teeth, he decided after a moment. When she did speak, it was with words that were gentle, though the pain was rolling off of her.

"Be true to what he wished to be, then." She walked toward the kitchen, pausing only to see that he followed her. "What's your name?"

"Connor. Connor Hawke."

"Dinah Lance, as you probably already know." She guided him to sit, so she could learn more, he thought, and began food for them both. It was, Connor suspected, as much to soothe herself by caring for him as to have a reason for him to stay, and he would take it.

+++

Dinah blinked and began to regret, again, buying the damned cellular phone. She looked at the time showing below the blinking 'incoming call' and realized it was nowhere near as late as she had thought.

"Getting old, Di," she said to herself before pushing the 'talk' button. "Your dime, quarter, what the hell ever."

"Have you considered our last conversation, Black Canary?" came the electronic voice of her recent temptation toward a way out of her ever-mounting debts.

"Look, I'm just not interested in a blind date with someone leading me on morally sketchy grounds."

"It would not be — "

Dinah hit the 'end' button, shoved the phone under the other pillow, and tried to go back to sleep. It might be very early for a costumed hero, but her ribs and hips and spine were all reminding her she had fallen two stories after being kicked off a roof.

"Not interested in stepping back into world events, Canary?" a voice asked from the shadows near her very much-had-not-been-open-a-minute-before window.

Dinah pushed up on her elbows and let her eyes penetrate the gloom. "You know, of all the ways I could have envisioned having you in my bedroom, this never was on the list, B."

He moved into the room, and came to sit on the edge of the bed when she moved a little. She rolled onto her side, though she was glad the oversize tee shirt she was in actually held tight at the throat, so he'd never see the scars along her upper torso. She kept her hands low, not wanting to draw attention to her wrists either.

"I came to reassure you, since the Oracle was having a hard time getting through your ingrained paranoia," he said, looking only at her face. "I know them. I personally suggested you, from their short list of candidates for a new style of tackling problems before they can explode into big ones."

"Surprised anyone even knew my name, to be honest," she said, tone a little flat, and her eyes sparking. She wasn't washed up; it was just harder to make ends meet and still hit the bad guys where it mattered.

"People who forget you do so at their own peril, Dinah. I certainly haven't." His gloved hand came to touch her face, brushing very lightly over a bruise there. "Try the Oracle's way. It will take a while for the technique to get fully in place, and they are trying other operatives. I just know that the right one is in this room, uncertain how to move forward from a life that was defined far too much by someone else."

She flinched, but the words had landed solidly, and she closed her eyes. "Why me, Bruce?"

He stood up, to begin making his way out, but paused at the window to look back at her. "Because under the Star City practical? There's a Gotham girl who watches out for the little man. I want her back in the skies, not sitting with her wings clipped."

He left, and she got up to secure the window behind him, looking out of it for a moment.

"Funny how you think she could ever fly," Dinah muttered before going back to wait for the phone call she was betting on now.

When it lit up, jingling the annoying corporate tone she had yet to figure out how to replace, she kept Bruce's words close.

"What about now?" the electronic voice asked.

"You're on, until I decide you're not what he thinks you are," she answered, embracing the unknown future.

+++

It was so cold. The sun was dying, humanity was rioting, and Dinah was so cold. Every trick of mind over matter that she had learned just didn't matter in the face of the overwhelming cold falling upon the Earth.

"Oracle, I'm back at my place. Going to grab a bite, try to get feeling back in my legs and nose, before I go back out."

Neither of them mentioned that it might be her last meal, that stopping to eat and warm might be a wasted effort. Neither one had the ability to admit that this time, Earth might really be doomed. She let herself in… and felt every hair on the back of her neck stand up at seeing the man standing by the mantle, gloved fingers on the photo from when she had been on the road with Oliver and… him.

"Parallax."

She kept her voice even, a mental tally of her Canary Cry bombs telling her she was on her own. No gadgets were going to save her from this being, the man that had replaced her friend, had stolen Oliver's will to live from him.

He turned, face drawn in lines that were cruel and calculating, instead of devil-may-care. She kept her eyes focused on him, forcing herself to ready for any move. She had never been good at surrendering in the face of uneven odds, after all.

"How could you fail him like that, Dinah?"

The disappointment, and edge of anger in the voice that was almost Hal Jordan's made Dinah see red. How dare he! She didn't remember picking up the vase beside her from the table. It sailed through the air right at his head on those words.

Maybe it was surprise at the primitive attack, but Parallax ducked instead of stopping the vase, and it shattered behind him on the wall around the fireplace.

"You absolute son of … no, your mother was always kind! I don't know where you get off calling ME out for Oliver, when YOU were the one that killed him!"

Green plasma flickered around hands and eyes, as Parallax's face twisted in anger.

"You dare — "

She cut him off. "I damn well do dare! You come into my house, the house where I had to try and reach him, try and pull his soul back out of the hole you shoved it into, and ask me how **I** failed him? Fuck you, Harold Jordan! Oliver was dead the instant he fired the shaft he put in your chest, you absolute bastard!"

Parallax's hand came up, stretching out in threat to her… and then clenched in a fist, dropping to his side once again. He closed his eyes as Dinah continued to vibrate in rage.

"I will fix this," he said softly, before he faded from her view, leaving her alone in the living room of her home. She dropped to her knees, having made it no further than the entry way, and wrapped her arms around herself, broken by her anger and grief all over again. She cried out for both the man she loved, and the one that had been lost, her heart awash with all of the might-have-beens.

She hardly noticed that she was warm now, the faintest of green flames having licked around her in Parallax's leaving. It took entirely too long to push back to her feet, and then, instead of eating, she turned to go back out into the streets, to try and keep order while the heroes, the ones that mattered, figured out how to save them all.

She was still out there when the sun blossomed behind the Sun-Eater, pouring out warmth and hope on all of Earth with green energies, testimony to who had saved them all. She looked up, the caress of a Green Lantern's light on her face, and tears running down her cheeks.

"Did you find yourself, Hal? I hope so," she whispered. Let him be with Oliver now, safely at rest. She would keep up the fight, and remember the men they had been.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Working with the DEA is something I have used to fill the gap between Grell's era and the Birds of Prey beginning, as Dinah was not appearing in Justice League International that much.


	13. Home to Roost

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Notes: Earthquake and aftermath, minor character death, teenagers volunteering to learn to be heroes

_2000s_

"Seriously, Oracle, how many times are we going to have to have this argument?" Dinah asked as she picked up the guns and threw them overboard, each of the men secured and glaring at her over their gagged mouths.

"You take too many risks," the electronic voice grated in her ear. 

"You're not here to know all the factors," Dinah countered. "It's my skin. I'm the one in the hot seat. So stop distracting me when the heat gets turned up, or I swear to god I'm walking."

It didn't matter that she'd finally paid off her bankruptcy, that she had managed to move across the country, back to Gotham. If the Oracle couldn't learn, after two years of off and on partnership, that the Black Canary was very much a Bird of Prey, then maybe it was time to be done with things.

She knew how to survive without help, after all. She'd done it for how long?

She thought Oracle had switched off, then the ear piece gave a tiny sigh. "A helicopter will be aboard the Coast Guard cutter, waiting to take you to shore, Canary. There's been a request for you to go to New York."

"Why New York?"

"The former JSA is gathering there. It seems the man known as the Sandman has died."

Dinah froze in place. Literal hell on earth had happened a couple of years prior, and all of the missing members of the JSA had emerged, taking their lives up. She'd heard they had even helped when Parallax had tried to remake the universe in his image, but she'd shied away from reconnecting with them.

It didn't mean she didn't care, and for there to be a funeral among the first ones… she had to go. "Thank you, Oracle. Costumed funeral, or civilian?"

"Looks like costume. Apparently his civilian partner is deceased?"

Dian Belmont. The pair had never married, but they had been close companions all of uncle Wesley's adult life. Dinah knew her, knew she had kept touch with Molly and Joan and the others that had lost their JSA family to Limbo. She hadn't known the woman had died since the return, and felt some grief for it.

Even barring the strangeness that had been Molly's bid to have more time with Alan, and the lingering rejuvenation that had given all of the generation, the JSA and family had survived a very long time against hellish odds. Losing members now was part of life.

Given how many of her own generation, and the one under hers, had been buried, Dinah knew more and more why her mother had wanted to keep her away from this life.

"I didn't know that," she finally answered the voice. "And I'll be ready to fly." She finished disposing of the guns, patted one young would-be terrorist on the head as she passed him to go to the pilot house, and made herself not think on all those gone before.

+++

Dinah adjusted her gloves as she greeted Jack Knight, son of the very man her mother had had an affair with. She was curious if he knew, but would never say one way or the other. She and Mama had come to terms on that, after all.

She wasn't expecting the soft eyes from Green Lantern or Flash in her direction. She had almost turned the taxi around, in fact, rather than face these long-lost members of her extended family.

She wished she had, when she saw Sandy there. He was… younger than she was now, despite being the original sidekick. All those years in stasis had caught up to them, making her the literal eldest of the next generation. She saw Jade, a hero she had known in California as Infinity Inc had made its mark. 

She thought there had been a boy like Jade, one with darkness as opposed to the light of the Lantern… but her mind was convinced that Alan Scott only had one child. Maybe she just had ghost memories of what might have been.

"Hellcat."

Dinah's heart leaped up into her throat at the gravelly voice, the old nickname. Staying aloof had kept her from reconnecting, and maybe a part of it had been the way the JSA had pulled back to their own lives when Daddy died. Maybe some small part of her had clung to the stubborn belief that it all could have been better.

She brought her eyes up to meet the warm ones looking at her through the cat's mask. The next thing she knew was being engulfed in the boxer's arms, held there, made to feel like she was just a little girl all over again, and she got the costume wet with tears of reunion.

"Hey, Wildcat," she finally said, biting back the 'uncle Ted' only because of the costumes. He shifted, tucking her under an arm, and walked her over to the older members, right where she belonged. She just hadn't ever had much reason to connect with her generation, while each of the elders had kept her for her parents several times, before family commitments pulled them apart.

"We've all been talking," Jay, the original Flash, said as Dinah and Ted stepped close enough, "that maybe we ought to be taking a more pro-active stance on things. Sand here," and he put an arm around the young man's shoulders, "thinks we need to, that what our friend died for means we have to step back up."

"We want you, Junior, to join us," Alan said. "In fact, it would be something of an honor, if you would, to bring the modern perspective to our team, since you're the League veteran."

Dinah's throat felt so closed off in that moment, and she had to make herself look at Sand, since this seemed to be his doing. In response, he reached out with a gloved hand, taking one of hers.

"I didn't ever get to know you, Canary, but if you're half the hero your parents both were? We need you with us. I… have the dreams. And they're pushing me to do this, to make a new guard from the old. Join us?"

"I've got other claims on me," she told them honestly. "I'm not ready to set them aside, but… to work with all of you?" She half-laughed, shaking her head. "Are you all trying to make a little girl's dream come true?"

Ted laughed, still with an arm around her. "Guess it could look that way," he agreed with her. "Is that a yes, though?"

"Yes, it is. I'm the one that would be honored to join all of you. I just hope I can stand up to the test."

"Little Miss," Jay said. "You passed all the tests years and years ago."

+++

"Oracle's offline," Dinah told Alan, as they hovered in the air, courtesy of the Starheart, looking at the wreckage of the bridge to Gotham, and then past, to the city herself with destruction clearly marked out on the skyline that had changed.

"That's your partner for your… clandestine heroics?"

He didn't mean to sound judgmental, and regretted it instantly, because Dinah tensed defensively. "Sorry, Junior. Never expected you to take to shadow-work."

"If I do it right, there's less to do on this side of the shadows." She pushed that away. "What do we do now?"

"You, my dear niece, are going back to help get the JSA ready and on alert, for anything that wants to take advantage of this. Our team will do the tasks needed by not having the resources of those who call Gotham home, keeping that from becoming a vacuum."

She didn't like it, but she didn't know Gotham well enough any longer to actually be of use even if she did convince him to put her inside the city. "And you?"

"Time to go throw money around, as the owner of Gotham Broadcasting," he said, hating it, but knowing he could do the most good that way.

"Be safe, Uncle," she said as he moved to take her back to the team, glad no one had actually gone home before the earthquake hit. "With Luthor in power…"

"I know, Junior. And I will. If your father's cousin was at the Capitol, I'll have at least one ally with more money to throw at the problem." 

Dinah nodded, having learned Jack Drake was a mover and shaker these days. She looked back at the city one more time, and whispered a prayer.

"Keep our city safe, B."

+++

"— 'ry… Canary?"

Dinah brought herself up out of exhausted sleep, almost convinced she was hallucinating. The voice was not the usual electronic one. This was a woman, with a Gotham accent on her code name. 

"At the tone, leave a message… beeeeep."

The woman on the other end laughed at that, and Dinah found herself smiling in response. "I know this isn't what you're used to, but I haven't gotten everything back together. I hope you don't mind?"

"O, I'm just glad to hear you online. I was worried." They had only just been able to return to Gotham, and even though dealing with JSA problems had tested her severely, she had insisted on coming back in with Alan immediately.

She knew he was trying to cope with the revelation that they had all forgotten Jade's twin brother, that the boy had become a twisted wreck of humanity's fears. She had just needed to get back and get her city on its feet again.

"I… thank you, Canary. And hopefully we can keep things local for a few days. I know you have joined the JSA, but Gotham — "

"Needs us," Dinah said firmly. "I know. My building made it through, enough for me to sleep here, but it's going to be a slumlord property soon enough. I want to see how I can help others avoid having this problem, maybe put the fear of a Cry bomb in some ears so they don't gouge everyone during rebuilding."

Oracle laughed softly at that. "I think I like your thoughts on that."

"Good. Because I didn't move across the country to the city of my birth just to lose it to," and she paused for dramatic effect, " _real estate investors_!"

Oracle howled with laughter at that, and Canary joined her, liking the sound of this woman on the other end of her gear.

+++

Dinah sighed as, yet again, the girl in purple was perched near her bike in the garage. 

"You're not going to give up, are you?"

"Nope." The mask kept Dinah from seeing for certain, but certain vocal qualities kept telling her this kid was in her mid to late teens.

"I don't do sidekicks."

"Not asking you to, B.C."

Dinah adjusted her gloves and walked over to the motorcycle the girl was beside. "Why do you insist on trying to get me, of all people, to train you?"

"Because Robin says you're the best."

Well, damn. Since moving East, Dinah had come to respect the scrappy little Robin, even if he was far more methodical than she normally saw in such young heroes. That was one more sign of Bruce's evolution maybe, or possibly the boy was just that detail-oriented. That he thought she was best was… interesting. She had seen his potential pretty thoroughly as they all got away from that stupid tournament, and Connor thought highly of Robin.

Given that Connor was one of the sweetest people and best judges of character, his friendship with Eddie Fyres notwithstanding, that she knew, it went a long way with her that the girl was invoking Robin's name.

"Tag along, kid. If people start shooting, you duck, but you can ride with me tonight. Want to go check out an old neighborhood."

She moved back to the lockers near the elevator, and unlocked one, dragging another helmet out. She pitched it toward the girl halfway back to the bikes, and nodded at the easy catch, and immediate attempt to make it work with her costume.

She wasn't breaking her 'no sidekicks' rule, but she could try and pass on some skills for surviving in Gotham.

+++

They had, so far, stopped three muggings, made a would-be rapist sing soprano, and chased some vandals away from the food bank office. All in all, it was a great night so far, and Dinah was finding the kid was good, if a little raw in how she handled herself.

Now, though, they were in the heart of the old neighborhood Dinah had chosen for a rare city patrol, with Dinah killing the engine on her bike and just staring at the darkened building, right on a corner, standing defiant of the trials the city had seen.

Dinah's eyes flicked over years of graffiti, saw the windows had all been reinforced and covered by boards at some point, at least on the street level. It looked utterly abandoned, and her heart ached, as she saw so many memories in her mind's eye.

"Stay with the bike, Spoiler," she said, removing her helmet and setting it down. 

"Got it, Canary." The girl was curious, but she was alert to potential threats in this area. 

Dinah went, jumping up on top of a weathered, beat-up dumpster, and then jumped again, catching the rung of the fire escape. It didn't want to move, either rusted in place or locked down, but that was okay. She was no Robin with all those acrobatics, but she could swing and twist herself up onto the landing.

The window there was intact, but Dinah remembered the rig of the lock, knew where to press and lift to make it slide open, albeit with a protest. Then she could slip in, after listening to be sure it really was empty.

She gave her eyes a chance to adapt, then moved through the apartment, seeing boxes of things stacked neatly along the walls. A quick check of one, using her phone for light, said the boxes were from her family. She found items that had not moved to Star City, like her crib and Daddy's pipe collection.

Everything indicated that no one had ever lived here again, yet Dinah distinctly remembered the sale of it funding their first year in Star City. Why had someone bought it and then never cleared it fully out?

She didn't take anything out of the rooms, not wanting to add theft to her breaking and entering of the night. She'd just wanted to see if the building had survived, and now… she was very confused. It had survived, and was a relic of her childhood now.

With the current state of real estate, and people needing to prove they owned their properties, finding out who had purchased it might be hard… or possibly not. She'd go pay a visit to the law firm her parents had kept a lot of their business with, see if they had kept a copy of the sale and go from there.

She went back out the same window, making it shut and tapping the lock to fall back in place. A scan of the street showed her some boys over near Spoiler, all looking like they weren't sure they should mess with a cape, but trying to psyche themselves up to it. Spoiler looked absolutely confident, but Dinah wanted to make a point. She dismounted silently with a spring against the wall rather than the dumpster, landed, and walked over until she was a few feet behind the five of them.

"Gentlemen," she said in a calm, level voice… and they whirled, faces going pale with realizing they had a Named Cape standing behind them. "See that building over there? The corner one?"

"Yeah?" the smallest of the four tried to sound belligerent, but the one nearest him smacked the back of his head.

"I'm coming back over here tomorrow night. If the street art is cleaned up, made to look a little better, I might have cash for anyone that helped." She saw the lean faces light up, then shut into paranoia. "Tags don't have to be gone completely. Just needs to not look like twenty years of different tags done so sloppily."

"Why should we listen to a Cape? How do we know it ain't a scam?"

She pinned that one with a stare, making him out to be maybe fifteen, but probably the smartest of the four boys. "You grew up here? Ask your mom or dad about 'Nets, and let them help you decide if you want to earn an easy few bucks. Now, excuse me."

She walked through them as they parted and put her helmet on. None bothered the pair again, and Dinah soon had them on their way out of Old Gotham, back toward her own place.

"How… why… ugh, both questions, about back there," Spoiler asked over the helmet comms. 

"Why? They were kids. Reach out, help them earn a place, you might get them turned into citizens. How? Learned a long time ago what living poor does to people." Dinah wasn't going to admit that was her childhood home, not yet. She needed to get answers first.

"That's the kind of thing I need to learn too," Spoiler said. "Not just how to fight better."

"Kid, I'm still not taking on a sidekick. But, when I'm in town, you're welcome to tag along."

+++

Between the JSA, his semi-retired status, and trying to spend more time with Molly, it was very rare for anyone to catch Alan in his office at the station's corporate building.

He was betting that Junior had had help to do so, and wasn't certain he trusted the pleasant look on her lips as she flirted with his receptionist. If she had tracked him down here, there had to be something intense on her mind.

He decided he'd take pity on Nathan, and stepped around his desk and into the open door. "It's alright, Nathan. This is my niece, just as she says. Junior, come on in here and stop flustering the young man."

"I'm not… I mean… umm, right. Today's reports," Nathan said, trying hard not to watch the pretty blonde walk by in her sun-dress.

Alan waited for Dinah to move past him, then shut the door and perched on the edge of his desk when she had taken a seat in one of the client chairs. She looked up at him, and sure enough the minxy smile was gone, replaced by confusion.

"What is it, Junior?"

"Why'd you let Mama think you'd sold the building? Why'd you take it for yourself?"

Alan shifted down to the other client chair at that, taking her hand. "You and your Mama needed the money, but none of us wanted to lose that little piece of history, Junior. That had been home to you three… and a refuge all of us had come to, many times, over the years she had the building. It was as much JSA history as the old museum was, and it felt right to preserve it. Your family was the only one that really stayed put, in a regular home, through those years.

"And a piece of me kind of hoped she might some day come home," he admitted. "Molly held the title through those long years we were gone, until your Mama did come back, to go into the assisted living place. Then she sold it, to try and keep the financial side of supporting your mother from being so fully on your back, Junior. She knew you'd never accept a handout, after all."

"She was right. And sneaky. Because she rigged the bills in a way to make it look like I was paying for everything." Dinah deflated some, though. "Any idea who she sold it to? It's still sitting empty. Came through the quake fine, not even a broken window."

Alan looked impressed at that. "Don't build them like that anymore, do they? Are you thinking about buying it back?"

Dinah bit her lip. "I don't know. I just want to make certain it's not one of the properties LexCorp is snatching up."

"I understand that," Alan said, making plans to acquire it if she did not. It just wouldn't do, at all, to lose that place to Luthor's company, even if Lex had supposedly divested himself of it. "I'll get into the paperwork, and see where she sold it, Junior. I believe I can text that information to you, just in case you're busy?"

"I'd appreciate that, Uncle Alan," she answered before leaning over on him. He put his arm around her shoulders, squeezing, before she stood up. "I'll try not to distract Nathan on my way out," she added with a giggle, much more friendly now that she had some answers.

"Please don't. He gets flustered enough when I actually come to work. His mother would be upset if she knew that," Alan said as he stood to. 

"Oh, that's Natty?" Dinah giggled. "He grew up cute."

"Junior, behave. He's twelve years younger than you, at least."

"Hmm, and?" She dodged the playful swat at her shoulder, and left him then, the door open so Alan could hear as she said good-bye to Nathan by using his childhood nickname. Alan shook his head and got back to work, amused at the impish woman, and concerned for her childhood home.


	14. To Fall Again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Notes: canon-level violence, graphic injury depiction, manipulative relationships

Alfred opened the kitchen door, unsurprised it was the one that had been reached, given who the visitor was. While Miss Lance had not been to the manor since her return East, he knew she'd been in the Cave, that she and Master Bruce were still enjoying the odd friendship that had grown over their adult lives.

"Hello, Alfred," she said with a smile and then a hug, not letting him sidestep for her to enter until she had gotten that. He had to smile, even as it brought back memories of a toddler on shaky legs, hugging a boy several years older than herself on the anniversary of the worst day of his life.

He sometimes wondered if Miss Lance had any memories of those first couple of years, as the Bowery had been the only place Master Bruce would go after that to buy the roses.

"Still the same, Miss Lance. Do come in." He guided her in after seeing she had carefully parked her bike on the flagstones to be out of the way and in no danger of blocking the sun to his garden, even a tiny bit.

"Sorry to show up unannounced, but I don't have a current number, and… it's personal, not business," she told him. "Hoping I can catch Bruce, and thought I'd have more luck here than at his office."

"Quite likely," Alfred agreed. "I can facilitate that, even." He saw her to a seat on the kitchen barstool, and set about putting the kettle on, knowing she drank warm tea or water, most of the time.

"Only if he's not busy," Dinah insisted, looking around at the changes in the kitchen, at the plastic still hanging to ward off dust from other parts of the manor. "Didn't escape the quake, I see."

"We were less affected than some, but yes, the effects were felt." Alfred chose to rely on the texting function of his phone, on the off-chance Mr Fox had allowed for Master Bruce to be involved in a meeting. [An old friend has stopped by, wishing to see you before your evening schedule.]

"I was helping a few days ago at the clinic," Dinah said, smiling softly. "Only had a moment to speak to Dr Thompkins, but she mentioned you'd been assisting during the day?"

Alfred nodded, not letting the playful tone draw a rise out of him. "So much noise here as they work. I do like to go and be useful in a place I can think, and it doesn't take much in the way of skill to sort medications back into dispensaries." 

"Of course," Dinah said, before choosing from the tea tray he set in front of her for the blend she preferred. Alfred glanced at his phone on the counter as it lit up.

[Home soon, depending on traffic.]

"Master Bruce is able to break away," he told Dinah. "While we wait, why don't you fill me in on things I've missed, Miss Lance?"

"Alright, Alfred. Thank you," she said, before giving him a very sanitized version of her civilian life while they waited.

+++

No car on the driveway in front meant Bruce circled on around to the side… and saw an iconic motorcycle sitting there. He wondered if it really was the original or if she had managed to find the right frame and just rebuild.

His curiosity also went from grimly worried to actually pleasantly amused. He had told Dinah she should stop by, the last time he had borrowed her social skills for an outing as Brucie.

He decided he'd park the car properly later — if Alfred didn't beat him to it — and went on inside the house through the kitchen door, finding Dinah chatting with Alfred.

He took that moment to actually see her. Her thirties were setting well on her, giving her a mature look that was very appealing on a physical level. She was, even in the sun-dress, obviously very much in shape, with definition to her arms and legs that did not betray how strong he knew them to be, not at rest anyway.

She had gone to keeping her hair blonde all the time, which was odd to get used to, but he thought it suited her. His eyes flicked to the heavy bangles at her wrists, noted that the sun-dress actually had a modest cut to the style and was more opaque than he'd expect from her usually. She also had leggings on, but that was probably a concession to the motorcycle, like the practical but cute sneakers.

All of that, he marked out in moments, crossing to sit in the other barstool, pleased that Alfred was actually sitting on one too, instead of being formal.

Then again, Dinah often had that disarming effect.

"Hello, Dinah," he said, reaching over so that she just took his hand instead of insisting on a hug. He wasn't certain he could endure a hug as sore as he was from the night before.

"Hey, Bruce." She played with his fingers, not letting go, as she looked up at his face. "So, like I told Alfred, this is a personal visit, not cape business. Except… it might be financial business?" She screwed up her features with a cross between a grimace and a scowl.

"Want to take it to the study? A little dusty in there."

"No, it's fine, as long as Alfred doesn't mind us?" Dinah said, looking at the older man.

"I could never mind such lovely company, and I am rather curious," Alfred told her.

Dinah nodded and forged on ahead. "Nine or ten years ago, Bruce, one of your company's subsidiaries, one dealing in real estate, bought a building in Old Gotham from Molly Mayne-Scott." She looked up at Bruce's face again, trying hard not to show too much emotion. "It's never been developed, left to sit empty, just as the Scotts had done when they bought it."

Bruce gently closed his fingers around hers. "If I said I'd willingly give you that building, just for all the support you gave Oliver and Roy and Connor and how many other heroes, you'd refuse, wouldn't you?" he asked her.

"Yes." She realized he knew just what building, and just why it mattered to her. "I don't have the reserves to actually renovate it yet, or put a business into it, but I'm doing a survey of the neighborhood. Planning on taking it to First Gotham, after I find some investors, and see about getting one of their incentive loans to do just that for the whole block. 

"The power lines need upgraded, but stayed up. The sewers are whole, and there are only minor adjustments needed for the water supply down there. The streets need resurfaced but aren't pitted. And I have yet to find a building whose foundation cracked."

Bruce had to sit back a little as he listened to her, was reminded that she had a brain for far more than just the hero business. "Making it fit all the criteria for being designated an economic stimulation zone," he agreed. "Most of the buildings in that neighborhood were meant to be businesses below and apartments above."

"There's a grocer and a head-shop in two of them, but the rest of the shop fronts are closed up, boarded over, or serving as open atriums to the apartments above? And from what I can see, the landlords have been converting the family dwellings, like mine was, into tiny cracker-box apartments. Which, I get it. We need space for people. But I think it could be done more fairly, and help the people living in Old Gotham get back on track."

That was Dinah, all over. Looking for a way to protect and better lives that most people forgot.

"You'd need to get people willing to go into business, investors, all of that… and you don't have a lot of spare time." Bruce watched her steel her shoulders and jaw at the objection, and gave her a soft smile. "Hold on, Dinah, before you take my head off.

"What I am thinking is letting my subsidiary company help develop this idea," he said. "Local businesses, local residents, and a careful mapping of what is likely to be supportable down there. They provide counsel for everyone willing to go in on the venture, help them negotiate protected terms on their loans, and provide the down payments, closing costs, admin fees. In return, the subsidiary takes five percent from each business, for a period of one year, once the business is on the profit side of the margin. If profit slides, the payment is delayed, but once twelve payments have been made, everything is free and clear on the owners."

Dinah listened, then slowly nodded. "You're rigging this to be easy on me, but it will be easy on people who have less cash to start, and that, I approve of."

"I see one small problem," Alfred said. "Old Gotham has a bit of a reputation for hoodlums."

Dinah gave a smile. "Already working on that. It's how I've managed my survey so far, bringing them into the idea of making a 'turf' worth protecting."

Bruce chuckled. "Trust you, Dinah, to enlist the nightlife to make it better."

"It's the only way we're ever going to keep the city safe, Bruce. Get them to care, give them hope, and it will heal."

"So optimistic," he said, amused but also impressed by the way she had tackled this. "Planning to open the Bowery, then?"

"Probably in a year or two," she said. "I'm getting old for this, Bruce. I'm thirty-seven this year, with nothing like what the kids have going for them, or you seem to. I've been hitting the streets for over twenty years, and unlike Oliver," she said, her voice only faltering a little, "I'm not willing to stay at it until it gets me killed."

Bruce got a lump in his throat, before he nodded. He still had no idea just what had stolen her Cry from her, or why she had slowly but surely pulled away from the League. He had heard from Oracle that she pushed herself harder than most any non-Bat Oracle had ever worked with. But, whatever it was, Dinah had a right to choose a future that was not laden with danger.

"Well, let's do all we can to get a solid neighborhood for you to keep safe again, then?" he said, forcing himself to say it.

+++

She was thirty minutes out from the location she had been given. There had never been a plan. Dinah was flying by the seat of her pants as she tried to make it to her partner's last known whereabouts. Dealing with Lady Vic and companions had cut the margin significantly, but Dinah wasn't about to give up, even if she had to fight the entire Legion of Doom at this point.

She was twenty minutes out when Oracle said it wasn't going to be enough.

Dinah never gave up.

Then she was there, at the edge of the water, and a bedraggled redhead was taking her hand, looking up with stress and hope alike. 

The face was familiar, something in the news… and Dinah nearly lost all of her aplomb at handling secret identities. She caught it by the tail, and verified that she was rescuing the right damsel in distress.

"You are the Oracle, yes?"

She hauled the woman up, out of the water, getting her on the decking surrounding the dock.

"Barbara, call me Barbara," the redhead said, and all of Dinah's suspicions were confirmed. Not just any Bat apprentice, but the Batgirl. Over and beyond that? She was the daughter of the last man her father had partnered on the force. Dinah had babysat her and her brother, ages ago.

"Can you walk?" she asked, knowing they had to move, and a moment later she wanted to kick herself. The Commissioner's daughter had been paralyzed some years before.

"Not really," Barbara answered, and Dinah cut off the attempt to explain.

"Oh, you're shot. Hang —"

"It's over, Oracle! You might as well come out."

Shit. Dinah looked at the redhead, felt her father's ghost on her shoulder, and forced a smile. "We'll have to do this again," she told the exhausted woman, rising lithely to go face the manipulator of all of this chaos.

There was no plan, but there was an objective. She would not let a partner fall into the wrong hands, and she would give anything to protect family. Dimly she heard Barbara tell her 'no' and try to crawl forward. Dinah just tossed her hair back over her shoulders and prepared to bluff things until the Oracle was safely in Bat hands.

+++

A psychopathic blonde woman who wanted to kill her, a talking gorilla with guns, and then there was Grimm… Dinah made herself push that thought, as much as it amused her, far from her mind. This was no joke. She had proven she could get the better of Grimm and Lady Vic, but Deathstroke the Terminator? That was going to take doing, while pretending to be tech and science savvy enough to pass as Oracle. She already didn't trust her chances with him though, given that Eddie Fyres had interfered with him when he had meant to kill her and Bronze Tiger some time back.

She had to get an opening, one that let her get the hell out of this mess without betraying anything about not being Oracle for real. If she did that, the hunt would start all over, and she didn't think the Bat Family was in any shape to do it a second time.

Deathstroke needling her over the line, and the fact she was crossing it to do Blockbuster's bidding was not something she'd be forgiving him for any time soon. She wanted to put her past behind her, and trying to adhere to Bat-level ethics, so that her uncles, and aunt now that Polly had come back, could be proud of her.

Sometimes, though, as she heard of Robin facing people who had been repeated problems, she wondered if that ethical line was costing the public more than they should have to spend in tears, blood, and loss. The merc's lazy drawl preyed on her mind as they actually made it into Gorilla City, when it became clear that she could not get free without trading off the death of one of the gorillas who just happened to match to Blockbuster.

The gorilla might not have been innocent, but he certainly hadn't done anything to warrant being cast under the knives of Grodd in the name of profit.

+++

Dinah looked from the scientist down to 'Cassandra', as her partner apparently went by if she was showing her face to the world. Her head hurt from the concept being explained to her.

"Let me sum up, in the immortal words of Inigo Montoya," Dinah said. "Cheshire came out two months ago, killed and injured some of your staff, but you figured out how to put an operative back before she escapes the time period she is trapped in, to stop her from escaping that early, and thus erasing the deaths and injuries?" 

"Exactly," the scientist agreed. "And capture her accomplices, who we believe did not come forward with her at that point but are there, based on our studies of the satellite you retrieved for us."

"Why me?" Dinah asked, because she did not enjoy crossing the Ravens' path, hated tangling with Cheshire if she could possibly avoid it. Deep down, she wanted to break the woman's neck and pretend to not know how it happened, to better protect Roy and Lian.

"One, you did retrieve the satellite originally and have already been exposed to its particular tachyon particle radiation, thus making it easier for us to attune the device we crafted. Two, they say that you are a very inventive and capable solo operative on search and retrieval missions. Three, you have a unique relationship with temporal energies as it stands."

Dinah wanted to facepalm at that. Yes, she had done her share of time-hopping, while she was having her very ill-advised fling with Ray Terrill. She had not realized anyone else was aware of that, since she had been mostly off the radar during those years. Seriously, what had she been thinking with Ray? He was so much younger and had been more than a little naive at first.

"Given the JSA events that have centered on time manipulation, either through your allies that called themselves Hourman, or via the time-terrorist Per Degaton, you are a prime candidate for actually being able to change time events," the scientist was saying, breaking her away from self-castigation.

Oh. It wasn't technically about Ray after all. She could roll with this then. And, if she were absolutely honest, she could not pin-point another JSA member that could effectively handle a jaunt to pre-Colombian America and do this.

"I don't like the 'changing time events' bit," Dinah admitted.

The scientist shook his head. "We have extrapolated that the individuals killed are likely to have a negligible impact, living or dead. It is more our concern to prevent any changes then that might have rippled forward unknowingly."

"Oh. That… yeah. Okay. Go back in time, delay and capture Cheshire, as well as her two henchwomen, and come out into a controlled environment with Checkmate ready to take them in. That should be doable."

"You're certain? You'll be flying completely alone, Canary," Cassandra said. Dinah flicked a smile and dismissive hand gesture at her. 

"Honey, I've been doing that most of my life. And I am very good at pulling people to my side of things. I know the Ravens. Gunbunny… wait, she's going by Pistolera now… and Vicious are both slightly unstable. The former has a crush on me. Pretty sure I can use those two facts to manage the pair of them."

"And Chesh?" her partner asked.

"I'll make it up as I go."

+++

"Di? Hadn't heard from you in a while. Lian misses you. Call me."

It was the third message from Roy, each increasing in worry for her. He knew Cheshire was on the loose again. He didn't know how bad that actually was.

She had tickets to Monaco, a little European vacation, but she didn't leave until morning. She really ought to call… or go across the bay…

She didn't trust herself to maintain the careful structure of not attacking Jade Nguyen to the boy that had loved her once, that had made a child with her unknowingly. She could not risk laying out just how vicious a criminal she'd become on a personal level where Lian might overhear.

Qurac had been bad enough. Qurac had been when Dinah damned her to hell for all eternity. But she avoided the subject completely with Roy, for Lian's sake.

Now? Now she was afraid for Lian, for Roy. Cheshire had tried to kill a man Dinah cared for, solely to inflict pain, and then vowed to kill her as well for daring to be so close to Lian, like a mother.

Dinah saved Roy's messages, and closed her phone, promising that she would get back in touch with him after her vacation. She'd be on a more even keel then, with sun and surf and dancing with strangers to settle her down. She'd take the partial victory of having put both of the Ravens into custody, that only Cheshire had escaped, and neither of her team much wanted her to keep breathing if they escaped.

Then, she would be able to talk to Roy and move on.

+++

Dinah had been working her way through the crowd with ease, until she bumped into a tall man, older by just that right amount to make him imminently tasty to her senses, radiating a sense of complete control.

"I am sorry, Monsieur," she said, giving him a dazzling smile and a once over intended to show she was interested in company if he was of a similar mind. 

"Ahh, Mademoiselle," the man said, flattering her by granting her a lot less age than she actually had, "I was obviously not pay nearly enough attention to my surroundings, that I could have been in the way of such a beauty as yourself. "Raymond de su Mer," he introduced. "And lacking in company of worth at this little soiree. Would you perchance be free to remedy that for me?"

Dinah's smile grew even more enchanting for him. She liked his confidence. "I'd be glad to, Monsieur. Dinah Lance." She watched for any flickers of recognition, and none came over him. Good. Sometimes she regretted having no secret identity, but traveling abroad brought less problems with it than being in America's larger cities.

He offered her his arm, folding a hand over hers once she took it, and escorted her further into the festivities.

This vacation was looking up dramatically, and made her very happy she had chosen to ditch it all and treat herself for a change.

+++

Dinah moved to the left, felt the blow land anyway. One after another, this behemoth of a monster landed punches that were destroying her, bit by bit.

She'd told Bruce she was getting too old, that she'd stop in a year or two.

It looked like she had overestimated her ability to make it that far. She could hear others trying to get to this point even as the foul vapors of the Pit were choking her. She didn't dare do anything but concentrate on the brute fighting her.

Damn. That… breathing had just gotten harder for her, and she didn't want to think about the fact that lung could collapse with the wrong move. Worse was that the brute had gotten a good grip on her, and she couldn't run anymore. 

One last effort, even as the ominous crackle of her spine told her everything was over, even if she beat him. 

She should have listened. She should have known the mystery count was far too good a thrill to enjoy, that there would be a price. 

She managed to look up, everything dimming, to see Blue Beetle and Oracle both right there.

Oracle should never be in the field like this. Except…

"You should use it." 

If Barbara Gordon was healed, allowed to use both body and mind in her crusade, that might begin to make up for the stupidity that had caused Dinah to put her at risk.

It was so cold, a cold she remembered from years before, the cold of death settling around her.

Was that the pale girl with the top hat and ankh over in the corner of the cave?

Then Beetle picked her up, and oblivion gathered her close, blanking out the pain and sense of failure completely.


	15. New Flightpath

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content notes: canon-typical violence aftermath, fluff, discussion of infertility

Some days, Nightwing was a very useful distraction, Dinah decided as she slipped into her apartment. She hadn't minded leaving Barbara's place in slippers and a robe, but if she was going to put her life back together, she needed to get dressed for it. She found her phone still on the charger where she had left it, and sighed to see it blinking with notice of messages.

She punched the voicemail speed dial, and deleted two from men she had hooked up with before getting to a new one from Roy.

"Di. Seriously worried. Heard from your uncle that one of his teammates is really not happy and it has something to do with you. Please call me when you get this."

Dinah muttered a curse in Vietnamese, flinched because that was _her_ language, and then closed the phone. She'd just go. She missed Roy, missed Lian, and figured that her stupidity with al Ghul needed to be addressed with him sooner, rather than later. She dropped Barbara's robe, began stripping out of the tee shirt and shorts that were made for a smaller frame than her own, and found her gear.

It didn't fit quite right, but would have to do, while she made a note to get in touch with the armorer Oracle used, to have it reworked soon. She went into the bathroom, thinking to take a quick shower with her own soap and shampoo, and stopped to glance in the mirror.

Just as quickly, she looked away, because the woman in the mirror was a stranger. There were no scars, no lines around the eyes, and her hair had never been this long in its jet-black state. The reset to her early or mid twenties was a psychological trip all its own; she wasn't sure she cared to take it just now.

She got into the shower, out again and got dried, then into gear and found clothes that fit well enough over top of it.

She could go face Roy, and try to figure out what to do about her hair.

+++

Argent was the one on ferry duty, and didn't have a problem bringing the bike over as well as Canary. She just picked them up in the silver plasma and carried them right over the bay to the island, before going on about her business. 

Dinah knew her way down into the Tower, and Argent had said which den Roy was working in, so she left her helmet with her bike and went that way. She managed to get in the doorway before the first worry of what he might think hit her, but it was wiped out as she stepped to where she could see in the den. 

Roy's tools, his weapons, were all laid out in component pieces on the table, while Roy himself was sitting on the couch, Lian standing balanced on his legs, telling him all about… swimming. It made Dinah smile because the child was so intent, and Roy's attention was fully on her, nowhere else, allowing Dinah to just lean there and listen for several minutes.

"And then Cerdian had to go nap, so Aunt Donna made me shower and now I am here!"

Dinah had to clap for that thrilling summary of Lian's day, making both look over at her. Lian's eyes went huge, while Roy's jaw actually dropped open in shock.

"Dinah?" he questioned as he marked out all the changes in her appearance with a squeak in his voice.

"Aunt Dinah, you don't look so tired! And your hair! It is like mine!" Lian flung herself off Roy with enough force to bruise his poor thighs, given her heels had dug in on the spring. She threw herself into an intense hug as Dinah dropped to her level.

"Tired, huh? Is that how you saw me being an old lady?"

"You'll never be old, Aunt Dinah," Lian told her solemnly, and Dinah tried hard not to laugh.

"Not so soon, anyway," she agreed, standing with Lian in her arms to go to the couch, dropping down beside Roy.

He looked at her and shook his head again. "Never saw your hair like this."

"You try putting this under a wig," Dinah teased him. "And now I either pay an arm and a leg to get it re-dyed, go back to the wig, or… go bat my eyes at Jason Blood for a talisman that lets me flip it at will? Might even be a help in trying to put a secret identity back together." 

Roy considered that, then shook his head. "No way you can pass for your own kid, Di. Even if you do look my age… err, the age I look?" He shrugged sheepishly at her _look_. "Okay, so like we found out when everyone got witched by Klarion, we senior Titans are kind of stuck at an age." He then pointedly looked at his still five-year old daughter. "But seriously, no one will buy a daughter of the Black Canary coming out of the woodworks now, when you look a little too old to be teenaged."

"Not contesting that," she said. "And I refuse to rebrand; I am the Black Canary. But I might retire Dinah Lance on my driver's license, maybe. Or not… I don't want to jump through hoops to get Mama's place moved under a new name.

"It was a thought, though."

"No reason you can't set up some new aliases taking advantage of the new age, under the Caped Protection Act."

"Point. And as much as I travel these days, probably a really good idea." She leaned in and kissed his cheek.

"So, you going to tell me what made this happen?" he asked as Lian was settling in Dinah's arms, eyes slowly lowering from her busy day of swimming and playing with her best friend (as much as an aquatic toddler could).

Dinah sighed deeply. "I don't want to, because you're going to find out how much of an idiot I can be," she said with a pout. "But… alright, starting at the beginning. Your first few messages I didn't return? I was on a mission back in time. About the time the Vikings visited America, to be exact," she told him.

"Really, Di? What even is your life with time traveling?" he asked her, half-teasing.

"I know, right? Anyway, there was a man —"

"Already jealous," he said, to give her a little levity, and she smiled at him for it.

"— that I got a little bit of a crush on. And my target decided it would be a great distraction to shoot him. I was chasing three rogues from now. Things kept me from learning right then if he lived or died, but history gave me an answer; he lived. Which, good, but some of what I learned from the main rogue I was chasing did a number on my head.

"So I took a vacation. I should have called you; I just wasn't ready to talk. Planned to talk when I got back," she assured him.

Roy was frowning, but he got an arm around her shoulders to keep her settled, and she really appreciated that.

"Vacation was going pretty damned good. Had met a rich guy willing to blow money on me… and then one of my partner's operatives showed up. I lost my mind at her, and stubbornly ignored warning signs about the new sugar daddy." She leaned her head over on his shoulder. "Partner, of course, was right. I'd gotten scammed in by none other than the head of the League of Assassins, Boy-o. Batman's rogue, al Ghul, the father, with help from his daughter."

"Holy shit, Dinah! He's like, top of several most wanted lists," Roy said, scared for her now.

"Yeah. No one told me he could be a real charmer." She stroked Lian's hair as the child continued to slide into sleep. "Turned out he was bride shopping, complete with the whole heir-making thing. Figured I could wriggle out with the whole 'I can't have kids' thing.

"Only he was warming up his evil magic fizzy bath to fix that," Dinah said. "Before you say a word, I am going to see Dr Mid-Nite in the morning. Needed to see you two first."

"Good."

"I went about trying to get free, got caught, and … well, partner pulled in people to help me. One of whom was Power Girl, as you learned, sort of, from Wildcat. They almost made it in time."

"Almost?" he asked.

Dinah nodded, eyes darkened in memory. "Blue Beetle and my partner reached where I was… after the Ubu I was fighting had broken my back, punctured a lung, and basically murdered my internal organs. I was," and she checked to see that Lian was actually asleep, "dying."

The arm around her shoulder convulsed, and Roy's lips went to her hair, as he reassured himself she really was there, whole and well.

"Easy, Boy-o." She nuzzled at him a bit before continuing. "My partner chose to have me put in the Lazarus Pit anyway, as al Ghul and company had already fled. I came up looking like this, insane, and able to Cry again. Which I did. Partner says I buried the Pit before it was all said and done, given that they barely made it out with me after tazing me, because of how badly I had shaken the place."

"Your Cry? You have it back? That's great, Di!" Roy couldn't help but touch her throat, and she hummed, just a little, making the energy buzz against his fingers.

"Going to have to relearn it, have to relearn my center of gravity, rework some of my moves because muscle memory and flexibility are now at odds," she told him. "Then, because of the insanity bit, my partner kidnapped me to her apartment and held me there for the last week to be sure I was over that.

"I actually owe your buddy Nightwing for distracting her long enough for me to escape," she told him. "Got home, showered, refused to have another crisis over the me in the mirror, and came here."

"Glad you did, even if you startled me," Roy told her. 

She made a quiet noise at that, then shifted enough to let him clean up his gear. "Go on, Boy-o. Finish that and then you can take me to dinner."

He grinned, but moved to get busy, while she held his daughter and thought about her next steps.

+++

Dr Mid-Nite perched on the corner of his desk as Dinah refused to sit down, standing in front of Charlie's perch in the corner of his office. He was betting her expression was distraught and trying not to be. He didn't even know where to begin on how to talk to her about her scans, yet he knew he had to tell her the full truth.

He just hated having to disappoint her, possibly, when she was the member that had found him and brought him into the JSA.

"I consulted with Mr Terrific, not naming who the subject was, as he has connections to the one other hero in the community that our search indicated had interacted with the Lazarus Pit previously," he began. "The circumstances seem to be quite different surrounding how the Pit was activated, I believe. It has a gruesome history, according to the source, that typically, two persons go in, and only one emerges.

"Yet, you were put in alone, and emerged, albeit in a very mentally changed state by your own words and the report your partner supplied."

She turned and now he could tell she was facing him fully. "Mid-Nite, you're beating around a very big bush," she said evenly.

Her voice stressors were very clearly marking out how fully she was controlling herself for this interview.

"Given the injuries you relayed to me at the time you lost consciousness, it may be that the Pit could only heal you so far. Your throat's injuries I had long since believed could have been healed with certain techniques, so it was a moderate concern. The spine and lung were critical, as well as stopping the internal bleeding."

"Go on," she said, and he thought he heard her hand move, as if waving him on.

He brought his eyes to a level with her face, based on where she was in the room. "The older damage seems to still be present. The scans still show massive scarring across numerous organs, including your reproductive system."

There was silence. Charlie wasn't shuffling or fluffing his feather in reaction to her, so she was contained in whatever her reaction was.

It took over a minute for her to say anything. "Thank you, Mid-Nite. If you'll copy my file up to the League, since Martian Manhunter insists on keeping me around as a Reservist, I'd appreciate it."

"Of course, Canary," he said, before he heard her moving, the door opening, and then closing behind her in the gentlest way possible. Charlie gave a tiny little whirr at that. "I know, my friend. I know."

+++

Dinah had bypassed visiting any of the others, just leaving a post-it on the group board in the rec room for Karen, telling her 'thank you'. She didn't really want to deal with any of her extended family reacting to her youthful looks. The good doctor would be sharing that as part of team briefing notes, and that was good enough.

It wasn't like she got to New York often for their missions. Oracle usually kept her busy after all. No, she would go back to Gotham, get her costume tailored, and start in on some of the paperwork that centered on getting turned way younger than she ought to be.

That in mind, she dug her earrings and necklace out, putting them on. "Oracle, can you make sure our tailor can see me? I don't want to fight in gear that doesn't fit quite right," she said once the connection was active.

"Can do, Black Canary," Oracle said. "Is that an 'I'm ready to work' alert?"

"Not until he takes in the costume, unless you want me digging out my 'nets and bustier," she said cheerfully, hiding the disappointment behind her walls. No one needed to know that news had hurt as bad as it did.

"I'd rather you not," Oracle said, with a faint laugh. "Okay, one appointment for this evening. He can probably mod one suit for you if he's clear, and work on the other pieces over the next few days. I don't think any of us have sent him pieces recently."

"Good. I'm itching to get back out, but I'll cope. After I drop them off, can I come over and see if the kids will work with me between calls?"

"I'll get them all on tap to join us in stages. Spoiler, then Robin, then Batgirl sound right?"

"Sounds peachy, partner of mine," Dinah said in her warmest voice.

"Thy will be done, Canary," Oracle told her with a smile. "How's Arsenal?"

"Great. How was Tightwing?" she shot right back.

"He'd hate it to hear you call him that," Oracle said.

"I know. He does. But I'm not stopping while he's in that skin tight suit that shows his assets so nicely," Dinah teased her partner.

"You're terrible."

"You didn't answer."

Oracle sighed and it was that dreamy so-in-love sound that Dinah knew she'd once been capable of.

Never again. Falling in love only ever left her with a broken heart.

"We had a really good night," Oracle admitted. "Thank you. I wasn't certain I was ready to let you go, but, it worked out in my favor."

"Glad to hear it, O. See you later tonight, alright?"

"Looking forward to it, B.C."

Dinah shut down the connection from her side, and headed out into traffic, ready to face whatever the future held… so long as it stopped involving bad decisions with men.

+++

Roy was shaking his head, as Lian sang a song and colored, when Dinah came to on her own couch in her apartment. Roy gave her a soft smile then, and stroked her hair back. She had dived right back into the deep end of being herself once she had a suit that fit snug again.

"So, dunks in the Lazarus Pit do not make you effectively immortal, you know?" he said. "Do I even want to know why or how it came down to a team of non-superhumans tackling the Slab? Or how you wound up getting in as deep as you did?"

"Talent, Boy-o," she croaked, before reaching up and rubbing her throat. "So not used to it yet."

"Your partner asked me to come sit with you, after Blue Beetle brought in the cavalry to get you, Bats, and 'Wing out of there."

"Joker?"

"League is on it, beautiful," he said. "You barely made it back to the rescue point and had more injuries than the other two, so you got benched. With me to enforce it." 

She sighed loudly. "That sucks."

"Oh, now, Di, my feelings are hurt," Roy said, pouting at her. "Lian packed a couple of board games, and I grabbed some Jamaican cuisine to split with you. Nice, quiet little interlude for the three of us."

She looked up at him with a shrewd glance. "And you don't have to worry your ass off about Nightwing?"

"Swear box!" Lian called out at the curse word, making Dinah giggle.

"There might be something to that," Roy admitted. 

"Alright, Roy. Let me drop some money in the swear box and go get into comfy clothes," she conceded.

"That's the spirit, Di," he teased her, before moving so she could get up.

+++

Dinah gave Oracle a very skeptical look. "More time shenanigans?"

"The island is a temporal anomaly that can be predicted. We need to get you on the island at a certain time, and you'll need to get off it within so many days, or the window to leave won't be for a few weeks," her partner told her.

"Are you trying to get me lost in the time stream?" she asked, but she was smiling and laughing as she asked it.

"Canary, that's the last thing I want. I'm kind of fond of you, even if you are a loud-mouthed, opinionated, hard-headed street fighter who refuses to take good advice when it's offered," Oracle said with just as big a smile.

"Oh I take good advice, honey. Just haven't heard any lately."

The pair laughed themselves silly from that, even as it was called back that they were on approach.

"Canary?"

"Yes, Oracle?"

"Be careful."

"Hey! It's me!"

"That's what I'm afraid of," Oracle replied, before checking over the parachute on the sat uplink. "You remember how to get this on and working, right, so we can keep communications with you, right?"

Dinah eyed the blocky thing like it might bite her, but she nodded. "You certainly made me practice it enough last night. Cut into my beauty sleep."

"Oh like you need any more of that, gorgeous," Oracle teased.

"Gee, thanks for noticing, sweetheart." 

They both sobered up then, and Dinah knelt in front of the chair to look up at Oracle. "I'll take it as nice and easy as I can. Get in, find these relics of World War II, steal their research and any product they have, then blow the lab."

"That's it. Walk in the park for you. We're counting on those antibodies you carry from Poison Ivy's handiwork giving you at least partial immunity to any live diseases they are playing with," Oracle said. "But don't hesitate to use the anti-tox pens in your gear if you feel ill."

"Teach a Robin to sit on eggs, would you?" Dinah said. "I've got this."

"We have no idea if you'll see competition, or who it will be, since word of this leaked out, Canary. Keep that in mind."

"Done!"

+++

The dinosaurs had definitely not been in the briefing. She supposed the iron bar in blue and orange that had caught her in the ribs, taking away what breath she'd been able to grab in running for distance fell under the 'potential competition' bit.

She was in so much danger if the big merc with a mouth and attitude was holding a grudge for her having abandoned him in Gorilla City when Militia had been such a Gardner and extracted her without a chance to help the others make it out.

Lucky for her, the dinosaur that had chased her wasn't impressed with Deathstroke's attempt to give it heartburn, and gave her an opening while she was still crouched down. Over her head, stirring a mighty wind, the tail went… and she heard the emphatic crunch as Slade Wilson, world-feared mercenary Deathstroke the Terminator, slammed into a prehistoric tree at speed.

"Okay, Canary, time to sing," she said, turning to face the dinosaur as it was lining up to gather up the tiny morsel that had dropped onto its hunting ground. She brought in all of the air she could, remembered to tighten her throat for actual concussive force, and Cried at the dinosaur. 

The force did push it back a step, and either that or the sheer noise did the trick, making it run off again, as fast as it could, to find a quieter snack.

Dinah looked over at the man lying unconscious at the base of the tree. She doubted she could secure him well enough to make him stay out of her way, and that would also lead to him being angrier at her. Or getting dino-snacked, and she didn't want to have that on her conscience. Not when he was the one telling her she was too close to the line in her memory already.

"Right, Big Guy. Get ready to feel a breeze," she said, walking over to field strip him before he came back to the land of the living.

One way or another, she was going to get him to actually cooperate with her so they both made it out of this hellhole with dinosaurs, plagues, and soldiers looking to kill everyone.

* * *

_to be continued in the further adventures of the OTPoW_


End file.
